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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



THE HEART OF LEE 



THE 

Heart of Lee 



By 
WAYNE WHIPPLE 

Author of ''The Story-Life of Washington,'* 

''The Heart of Lincoln;' "The Heart of 

Washington ;* etc. 




PHILADELPHIA 

GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



Copyright, 191 8, by 
George W. Jacobs & Company 



All rights reserved 
Printed in U. S. A. 



OCT 19 1918 

■©a.A50;}892 



» 


CONTENTS 




I 


The Heart of Chivalry . 


7 


II 


The Heart of " Light-Horsi 
Harry" 


14 


III 


His Mother's Son 


. 27 


IV 


Cadet to Captain 


► 36 


V 


In Mexico with Scott 


56 


VI 


" From Pillar to Post " . 


75 


VII 


Loyal Even in Rebellion 


III 


nil 


On the Mount . . . , 


. 186 



THE HEART OF LEE 



THE HEAET OF CHIVALEY 

Fair Land of Chivalry, the Old Do- 
main! ... 

Yet hast thou scenes of beauty richly 
fraught 

With all that wakes the glow of lofty 
thought. 

— Mrs. Henians, 

Into the great stone house at " Strat- 
ford '* in Westmoreland, the Virginia 
county in which Washington was born, 
an infant came on the 19th of January, 
1807. He appeared in no way different 
from nearly every other white baby 
boy born in the Old Dominion, but his 
antecedents and surroundings were 
unique — for an American child, at least. 

" Stratford House," in whose spa- 
cious chambers this boy, named Robert 
7 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Edward Lee, first saw the light, was a 
combination of mansion, i)alace, castle 
and stockade. Built with the thick 
stone walls of a fortress, it served as a 
sort of palatial block-house to protect 
its inmates — and all the peoj)le for 
many miles around, if sufficient warn- 
ing were given — in case of attack. 

The first house, named for the ances- 
tral estate of the Lees in England, and 
built by Richard, the first Lee who 
emigrated to Virginia, had been burned 
to the ground. His grandson Thomas 
determined to build a mansion which 
would " endure unto many genera- 
tions." To help in doing this, Queen 
Caroline of England sent him, as to an 
absent knight, a handsome largess from 
her private purse. The Lees had been 
friends at the English court for five or 
six centuries. Here are a few of the 
noble names in the annals of chivalry: 

Launcelot fought under William the 
8 



THE HEART OF CHIVALRY 

Conqueror at Hastings; Lionel went 
with Richard Lion-heart in the Third 
Crusade; and Sir Henry was made a 
Knight of the Garter by Queen Eliza- 
beth. 

So little Robert, when he was old 
enough to run about the mansion, then 
a century old, heard, along with ancient 
tales of the "Knights of the Table 
Round," similar stories of the doughty 
deeds of his own forbears. A favorite 
place for such recitals was the flat 
arbored roof, where musicians had 
used to play while the " First Families 
of Virginia " promenaded and listened, 
and Colonial youths made love to ladies 
fair. 

No wonder this diminutive scion of 
the purest and best of English chivalry 
— that of Walter Raleigh and Philip 
Sidney — grew up to consider all that 
sort of thing a family affair. Still, it 
needed even more than the flower of 
9 



THE HEART OF LEE 

English knighthood to produce that 
consummate flower of the chivahy of 
the Old Dominion, Robert E. Lee. 

The Lees were among the leaders 
who remained loyal to the House of 
Stuart through the Civil War of the 
" Roundheads " and " Cavaliers " of 
England. When Charles the First was 
beheaded, Colonel Richard Lee emi- 
grated to the new province of Virginia, 
which Sir Walter Raleigh and other 
knightly adventurers had settled and 
named in honor of " Our Dread Souver- 
eign Ladye, Good Queen Bess." 

His son Richard, the second of the 
name in America, was the friend and 
adviser of Governor Spotswood, the 
great-grandfather of Anne Carter, who 
became the wife of Henry Lee and the 
mother of Robert; and this little boy of 
" Stratford," traced back, through her 
and this provincial governor, to Robert 
Bruce, the Scottish conqueror. 
10 



THE HEART OF CHIVALRY 

Under the roof-garden of " Stratford 
House " were born these heroes of 
Colonial days: 

Richard Henry Lee, called " the 
Cicero of the Revolution," who made the 
historic motion in the Continental Con- 
gress, that all the American colonies 
assert their independence; Francis 
Lightfoot, who, with his brother Rich- 
ard Henry, signed the Declaration of 
Independence; and Arthur, a younger 
brother, who represented the struggling 
colonies at four courts of Europe, and, 
with Benjamin Franklin, helped bring 
about the French Alliance which 
enabled Washington, with his worn-out 
army, to win the independence of the 
LTnited States. 

These three brothers were cousins of 
Henry Lee, the " Light-horse Harry " 
of the Revolution, the father of Robert 
E. Lee. It was, therefore, a matter of 
course that the Lees were admitted to 
11 



THE HEART OF LEE 

be leaders among " the First Families 
of Virginia" — that charmed circle which 
even the Washingtons entered through 
jMajor Lawrence Washington's mar- 
riage to a daughter of the Fairfaxes, 
and through Colonel George Washing- 
ton's wedding the widow of the wealthi- 
est of the Custises. 

Through many intermarriages among 
the " F. F. V.'s," Robert E. Lee was 
connected with nearly all the leading 
families of the Old Dominion and 
Maryland. If any one had a right to 
indulge in family pride it was he — but 
he seemed wholly indifferent to distinc- 
tions of birth. When he was a white- 
haired general, writing from the front 
to his wife, he expressed the following 
wish concerning a gentleman's proposal 
to trace out and publish a book showing 
his family tree: 

" I am very much obliged to Mr. 
Blank for the trouble he has taken in 
13 



THE HEART OF CHIVALRY 

relation to the Lee genealogy. I have 
no desire to have it published, and do 
not think it would afford sufficient in- 
terest beyond the immediate family to 
compensate for the expense. I think 
the money had better be applied to 
relieving the j)Oor." 

He was passionately^ devoted to the 
memory of his father, and to every 
member of his own family, but he 
thought more of the good he could do 
for those around him than of the ad- 
ventures of those who lived centuries 
ago. For a modern knight, pure and 
simple, like Robert E. Lee to boast of 
his ancestry is as unthinkable to those 
who knew him as of Sir Galahad prat- 
ing of his pedigree! 



la 



II 



THE HEART OF 
"LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" 

Thou art my father, and thy gain is mine. 

— Matthew Arnold. 

One reason assigned for Washing- 
ton's partiality to Harry Lee can never 
be proven — that the young man was the 
son of his first love, a young lady older 
than himself, to whom he referred in a 
letter to another youth as " the Low- 
land Beautj^" But the identity of the 
object of this boyish love is shrouded 
in a mystery somewhat like that which 
surrounds " Junius " or " the Man in 
the Iron Mask." 

Wliatever may have been the reason, 
it was well observed by many of General 
14 



" LIGHT-HORSE HARRY " 

Washington's friends that he showed a 
special fondness for the versatile young 
officer of the Revolution. To " Light- 
horse Harrj^'s " bravery and brilliancy 
Avere added his rare force and skill as 
an author, debater and orator. These 
seemed to intensify the admiration and 
love of the fatherly General and Presi- 
dent, as in the case of his deep affection 
for Alexander Hamilton which stood 
the long strain of that young official's 
temperamental touchiness and his un- 
reasonable jealousy of Jefferson. 

But Harry Lee made no such draft 
upon the friendship of his chief. He 
was an agreeable companion withal, 
both kind of heart and witty in con- 
versation, which the First President en- 
joyed with all the gusto of a seasoned 
epicure. As he had no children of his 
own, it is rather pleasant to think of 
" Light-horse Harry " as the son of the 
lady he had loved and lost. Nor should 
15 



THE HEART OF LEE 

it excite wonder if that father-hearted, 
childless man recognized the sonship of 
young Lee as truer than that of his 
wife's grandson, who became his by an 
adoption enforced by the death of his 
ste]3son, this boy's father. WTiether or 
not Washington could bring himself to 
believe it, George Washington Parke 
Custis was a commonplace young 
gentleman whose sole claim to popular 
interest lay in the fact that he was the 
adopted son of the Father of his Coun- 
try, and finally inherited the larger 
share of the great estate of his grand- 
father, who was Martha Washington's 
first husband. 

Although the master of Mount Ver- 
non may never have acknowledged, even 
to himself, the true spiritual kinship of 
Henry Lee, that bright young officer 
was a man after his own heart. After 
being graduated from Princeton he 
joined the army in the Summer of 1777,^ 
16 



"LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" 

along with Lafayette, another young 
man Washington soon learned to love. 
The French marquis was also a great 
admirer of Harry Lee — was it not, in 
i:)art at least, to gain more favor with 
the great commander? 

Although the General's paternal in- 
terest in Lee was manifest in the field, 
there was no partiality shown in the 
matter of promotion until the young 
student had won his spurs. Washing- 
ton did not have long to wait for this. 
At Valley Forge, already a captain of 
dragoons, Lee had also won the title 
which clung to him always — " Light- 
horse HaiTy." 

A British foraging party of two- 
hundred horse attacked a stable and 
warehouse which Captain Lee had to 
guard with only a few men. There is a 
note of boyish exulting in his report, to 
the chief, of this skirmish: 

" So well directed was the [our] op- 
17 



THE HEART OF LEE 

position that we drove them from the 
stables and saved every horse. We 
have got the arms, some cloaks, etc., of 
their wounded. Their enterprise was 
certainly daring, though the issue was 
very ignominious. I had not a soldier 
for each window." 

Irving, in his " Life of Washington," 
goes on to relate: 

" Washington, whose heart evidently 
warmed more and more to this young 
Virginian officer, the son of his * Low- 
land Beauty,' not content with notic- 
ing his exploit in general orders, wrote 
a note to him on the subject, ex- 
pressed with unusual familiarity and 
warmth. . . . 

" In effect, Washington, not long 
afterwards, strongly recommended Lee 
for the command of two troojDS of 
horse, with the rank of major, to act as 
an independent j)artisan corps. . . . 

" It was a high gratification to Wash- 
18 



"LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" 

ington when Congress made this ap- 
pomtment; accompanying it with en- 
comiums on Lee as a brave and prudent 
officer who had rendered essential serv- 
ice to the country and acquired dis- 
tinguished honor to himself and to the 
corps he commanded." 

" Light-horse Harry " was one of the 
heroes with " Mad Anthony " Wayne 
at Stony Point, where he was reported 
for bravery with the new rank of Major. 
Then came Paulus Hook, where he was 
in command, performing a feat so dar- 
ing that he received another meed of 
praise from Congress, by whose order 
a medal was struck in commemoration 
of his brave exploit. General Wash- 
ington, proud and happy, sent his young 
friend another letter of congratulation. 

Colonel Lee spent the later years of 

the war in the South, as leader of his 

own company, called " Lee's Legion," 

under the immediate command of Gen- 

19 



THE HEART OF LEE 

eral Nathanael Greene, who wrote of 
him to the president of Congress that, 
as chief commander for the Southern 
States, he was " more indebted to this 
officer than any other for the advantages 
gained over the enemy in the last cam- 
paign." 

After the Revolution Colonel Henry 
Lee entered upon a political career 
quite as brilliant as his military achieve- 
ments. He was a delegate to the con- 
vention which met to approve the Con- 
stitution, and took an active part in its 
deliberations. From 1792 to 1795 he 
was Governor of Virginia. While act- 
ing in this capacity, President Wash- 
ington appointed him to lead the fif- 
teen thousand militia sent to quell 
the " Whisky Insurrection " in certain 
counties of western Pennsylvania, and 
accompanied him from Philadelphia, 
then the national capital, to Bedford, 
in the southwestern part of that State. 
20 



" LIGHT-HORSE HARRY " 

After the First President retired to 
his long-yearned-for "vine-and-figtree" 
at Mount Vernon, ex-Governor liee 
was his most frequent guest. It was 
observed that Harry Lee could " say 
things " to the ex-President which 
would never be tolerated from any one 
else. Mrs. Washington would flush 
and purse her lips at these liberties until 
she noticed, with some surprise, that 
" the General " did not mind them. 
Still, this vivacious visitor kept the good 
lady of Mount Vernon in a constant 
state of nervous excitement. 

One day, at table, the host mentioned 
that he was in need of a span of carriage 
horses. 

" I have a fine pair, General,'* Lee 
promptly replied, " but you cannot get 
them." 

"Why not?" Washington asked, 
surprised. 

" Because you will never pay more 
21 



THE HEART OF LEE 

than half price for anything, and I must 
have full j)rice for my horses." 

This left-handed compliment to the 
GeneraFs shrewdness in a horse-trade 
made Mrs. Washington laugh nerv- 
ously. A parrot, X3erched near her, 
joined in the immoderate merriment. 
This set General Washington laughing 
too, and he responded without resenting 
his guest's salh^ : 

" Ah, Lee, you are a funny fellow. 
See, that bird is laughing at you! " 

Ex-Governor Lee was elected to the 
national House of Representatives in 
1799. General Washington died in 
December of that year. There was a 
special fitness in George Washington's 

" Brother at once and son " 

being chosen to deliver the eulogy in 
honor of the Father of his Country be- 
fore both Houses of Congress. The 
actual words which Henry Lee pro- 
22 



"LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" 

nounced for the first time on this great 
occasion were: 

" First in war, first in peace and 
first in the hearts of his fellow- 
citizens/' 

but the last word has been changed by 
popular authority to " countrymen." 

Henry Lee first married his cousin 
Matilda Ludwell Lee, through whom 
" Stratford " came into his possession. 
IMatilda and her children having died, 
he married, as his second wife, Anne 
Carter of " Shirley," a sightly estate 
on James River. Robert Edward, born 
in 1807, was five years old when war 
was declared against Great Britain, and 
his father was made a Major-General. 
But before General Henry Lee could 
enter this war he was badly injured 
while defending from an angry mob his 
friend who was a newspaper editor in 
Baltmiore. So he had to go to the 
23 



THE HEART OF LEE 

West Indies in search of health in- 
stead of going again into his country's 
service. 

In this place of his banishment, Gen- 
eral Lee — no longer the " Light-horse " 
or the " Light-heart Harry " of other 
days — penned his " Memoirs of the 
War in the Southern Department." 

Meanwhile he kept on writing faith- 
fully and fondly to his wife and " the 
little ones at home," asking especially 
what his boys — Charles Carter, Sydney 
Smith, and Robert EdAvard — were do- 
ing; if they were learning to ride horse- 
back and to shoot straight. He also 
tried to impress truths upon them, 
of religion, morality and learning. 
" Fame," he charged them, " in arms 
and art, is nought unless betrothed to 
virtue." 

Once he wrote to his wife: " Robert 
was always good, and will be confirmed 
in his happy turn of mind by his ever- 
24. 



"LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" 

watchful and affectionate mother. Does 
he strengthen his native tendency?" 

After nearly five years of this sad 
separation, the devoted father, at last 
giving up hope of recovery, started 
home to die, as Lawrence Washington 
journeyed back from Barbados, sixty 
years before. On the way General Lee 
became so ill that he begged to be put 
ashore on Cumberland Island, off the 
coast of Georgia, where the family of 
his old friend. General Greene, still 
lived. The general's daughter did all 
she could to relieve his sufferings, which 
at times were so excruciating as almost 
to rob him of his reason. 

A skillful surgeon, who was called to 
see him, urged him to undergo a certain 
operation, in the desperate hope of sav- 
ing his life. General Henry Lee's an- 
swer was an illustration of the " ruling 
passion strong in death: " 

" My dear sir, were the great Wash- 
25 



THE HEART OF LEE 

ingtoii alive and here, joining you in 
advocating it, I would still resist! " 

He did not live long after this. 
" Light-horse Harry " was denied even 
the boon of gathering his family around 
liis dying bed. In almost his last utter- 
ance he breathed the dear name of 
Washington. He was buried in the 
garden near the grave of General 
Greene. His son Robert was only 
eleven, the age of little George Wash- 
ington when he lost his father, and was 
left to be the stand-by " of his mother, 
and she was a widow." 



26 



Ill 

HIS MOTHEE'S SON 

With a hand as gentle as woman's. 

— Longfellow. 

Because of the frequent intermar- 
riages among the " First Families," 
most of the " gentry " of the Old Do- 
minion were so related that " a Virginia 
cousin " became the common phrase 
for a distant connection. Through this 
custom the people of influence in the 
State were merged into a great family, 
so that the initials " F. F. V." might 
have stood for the one First Family of 
Virginia. Of the first five Presidents 
of the United States, four of them — 
Washington, Jefferson, Madison and 
Monroe — all resided in Virginia, within 
driving distance of one another! 
27 



' THE HEART OF LEE 

Therefore, Virginia had a certain 
right to ask herself: 

" Was not the Father of his Country 
and leading Federalist one of US? 
And the original Democrat with his 

* Jeffersonian Simplicity ' — was he not 
ours? Who was ' the Father of the 
Constitution ' but our ' great, little 
Madison? ' And James Monroe — did 
he not absorb the Monroe Doctrine, of 

* America for Americans ! ' from the 
very breast of Mother Virginia? " 

Then why should not the Mother of 
Presidents and the Father of his Coun- 
try be conscious of a good claim to be 
both head and heart of the United 
States of America? 

On all these accounts "Old Virginia" 
considered herself the organizer and 
builder, as well as the founder of the 
nation, by a hereditary, divine and con- 
stitutional right. 

When Robert E. Lee was born into 
28 



HIS MOTHER'S SON 

this great Virginia family, Thomas Jef- 
ferson of " Monticello " occupied the 
President's chair. James Madison of 
" Montpellier " and James Monroe of 
" Oak Hill " — all nearer together than 
" Stratford," his father's estate, and 
" Shirley," his mother's home — were 
yet to take the helm of state and be 
among his earlier recollections. Robert 
was only five when the War of 1812 was 
declared. As soon as he could under- 
stand, he heard British infringements 
on American rights discussed with deep 
earnestness, and often with bitterness, 
for the Second War for Independence 
was but the continuing of the old 
struggle for liberty. " Boarding our 
ships and impressing sailors into the 
service of England, to make them help 
fight her battles with Napoleon, is as 
wicked and unlawful as to break in and 
rob our homes," they said in his hear- 
ing^ — " for a man's house is his castle ! " 
29 



THE HEART OF LEE 

" Stratford House " was filled with 
family portraits and Colonial furniture, 
each having its own history and signifi- 
cance. The servants loved to take the 
dear, earnest little fellow up to the roof, 
and sit under one of the canopies there 
to tell him about all the brave gentle- 
men who were " raised on the place," 
while the boy's father told him of the 
noble knights, " without fear and with- 
out reproach," who bore the name of 
Lee, with the banner of the Cross, and 
waged war against the Turk, to wrest 
from him the Holy Sepulchre. 

Much as the tales of Christian 
chivalry appealed to the little boy, he 
liked still better to hear of the exploits 
of his own handsome father and his 
cousin Richard Henry, with Washing- 
ton, in the Revolution. 

When Robert was four. General 
Henry Lee removed to Alexandria, be- 
tween Mount Vernon and the national 
80 



HIS MOTHER'S SON 

capital, to educate his growing children. 
Here the family attended old Christ 
Church, held doubly sacred because 
Washington had worshiped there. Be- 
sides returning often to " Stratford," 
the Lee boy sometimes went wqth his 
mother to visit Grandfather Carter at 
" Shirley." 

After General Henry Lee had gone 
to the West Indies, hoping against hope, 
to recover his health, the lad's heart fol- 
lowed the absent father, alone in a dis- 
tant land. This love for his father and 
his boyish devotion to Virginia's great- 
est son, Washington, were soon blended 
into a passionate patriotism as the 
devout lad grew to manhood. All this, 
in its fervent intensity, was poured out 
upon his native State, of which his 
father had been a soldier, leader, states- 
man and governor — especially after 
that sainted exemplar had taken his 
journey to — 

81 



THE HEART OF LEE 

" The undiscover'd country from whose 
bourn 
No traveler returns." 

When the tender letters ceased to 
come, and the little ones were told, in 
a solemn hush, that they could never see 
their blessed father's face again, eleven- 
year-old Robert took it uj)on himself to 
comfort and care for his invalid mother. 
One of the cousins related of him about 
this time: 

" I remember Robert well as a boy 
at school to Mr. Leary at the Alexan- 
dria Academy, and afterward at the 
school of Mr. Hallowell, when his 
mother lived next door. I recollect his 
correct deportment at school and else- 
where, and his attention to his studies. 

" What impressed me most in my 
youthful days Avas his devotion to his 
mother, who was for many years an 
invalid. . . . He was her house- 
keeper, relieved her of all domestic 
32 



HIS MOTHER^S SON 

cares, looked after the horses, rode out 
m the carriage with her, and did the 
marketing." 

Another cousin told of young Robert 
while he was going to school next door, 
hoping to fit himself, if possible, to enter 
West Point: 

" Wlien he was going to Mr. Hal- 
lowelFs school he would come out at 
twelve o'clock, have their carriage 
gotten, and go with his mother to ride, 
doing and saying everything to amuse 
her. When she was sick in bed, he 
mixed every dose of medicine she took, 
and nursed her night and day." 

Robert was his mother's fourth child. 
His eldest brother, named Charles 
Carter, for his mother's father, was at 
Harvard College. Sydney Smith Lee 
was in the Naval Academy at Annap- 
olis. Anne, the sister older than him- 
self, was already a partial invalid, and 
away from home much of the time. 
33 



THE HEART OF LEE 

The youngest child, Mildred, was too 
small to be of assistance to him. 

As the handsome youth grew taller 
and stronger, his mother became more 
feeble and helpless. IVIost of his time 
out of school was devoted to her. The 
neighbors used to tell how he carried 
her in his arms to and from the old- 
fashioned family coach. Having placed 
her within, he arranged the cushions — 
always chatting gaily and doing his 
best to cheer and entertain her. Thus 
Robert became almost his mother's only 
happiness. 

Feeling that the family could not 
afford to let him go to college, as his 
brother Carter had done, and since 
Smith was now in the Navy, Robert 
determined to be a soldier, like his father 
and the venerated Washington. Carter 
was already a practising lawyer, so a 
friend of the family remarked that Mrs. 
Lee should be proud and happy to have 
34 



HIS MOTHER'S SON 

one son in the State, one in the Navy, 
and the third in the Army. 

The feeble, dependent mother was too 
unselfish to wish to spoil her noble son's 
career, so she encouraged him in his 
ambition to be like his brave father; then 
he took the necessary steps for entrance 
at the United States Military Academy. 

When her tall stand-by had gone 
away to the West Point Academy, the 
heroic little mother exclaimed, with a 
hopeless sigh: 

" How can I do without Robert? He 
is both son and daughter to me! " 



85 



IV 

CADET TO CAPTAIN 

The sex was ever to a soldier kind. 

—Pope. 

The 3^outh of eighteen who registered 
at West Point Military Academy in the 
Summer of 1825 had — thanks to his o\Ym 
ambition and thoroughness — more than 
usual preparation. The entrance re- 
quirements were quite simple, hardly 
more than " Reading, Writing and 
Arithmetic," but he had studied Latin 
and Greek, besides mathematics and 
drawing. 

Mr. Benjamin Hallowell, the strict 
Quaker master who had conducted 
Kobert Lee's recent studies, has left on 
36 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

record that " he was never behindhand 
in his studies, never failed in a single 
recitation, was perfectly observant of 
the regulations of the institution; was 
gentlemanly, unobtrusive, and respect- 
ful in his deportment to teachers and 
fellow-students." 

Also that he did with " a finish and 
neatness everything he undertook. One 
of the branches of mathematics he 
studied with me was conic sections, in 
which some of the diagrams were very 
complicated. He drew the diagram on 
a slate; and although he well knew the 
one he was drawing would have to be 
removed to make room for another, he 
drew each one with as much accuracy 
and finish, lettering and all, as if it were 
to be engraved and printed." 

No one realized then that this mani- 
festation of the courteous, good-tem- 
pered young man was but the budding 
of genius. 

87 



THE HEART OF LEE 

At that time, drunkenness and other 
dissipation were found among the 
cadets. The story of Robert Lee's 
course there is one of uniformly correct 
dei)ortment, for he passed through the 
whole four years without a single 
demerit. He did not drink with his 
friends, though nearly every one in 
those days thought conviviality was 
necessary in the society of gentlemen. 
He did not even smoke. When a 
fellow-student proposed the least in- 
fraction of the rules, he declined with a 
smile so frank and kind as to disarm the 
natural resentment which such refusals 
generally arouse among young men. 

Robert E. Lee's conduct at the Mili- 
tary Academy was so exemi)lary that 
if it had not revealed the heart of a true 
gentleman, other young men would have 
shrugged and called him a " prig " or 
a " snob " — the contemptuous epithets 
too often misapplied. 
88 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

Though there was no trace of super- 
ciliousness in his manner. Cadet Lee did 
not wear his heart on his sleeve. Joseph 
E. Johnston, afterward the great Con- 
federate general, said of their life to- 
gether at West Point: 

" We had the same associates, who 
thought as I did, that no other youth or 
man so united the qualities that win 
warm friendship and command respect. 
For he was full of sympathy and kind- 
ness; genial and fond of gay conversa- 
tion, and even of fun, that made him the 
most agreeable of companions, while the 
correctness of his demeanor and lan- 
guage, and attention to all duties, both 
personal and official, and a dignity as 
much a part of himself as the elegance 
of his person, gave him a superiority 
that every one acknowledged in his 
heart." 

" He was the only one of all the men 
I have known who could laugh at the 
80 



THE HEART OF LEE 

faults and follies of others so as to make 
them ashamed without touching their 
affections." 

Another West Point cadet has said 
of him since: 

" He never * ran the sentinel post,' 
did not go off the limits to the * Benny 
Havens ' of his day, nor put ' dummies ' 
in his bed to deceive the officer in charge 
as he made his inspection after * taps,' 
and at the parades stood steady in line. 
It was a pleasure to look down the 
barrel of his gun, for it was bright and 
clean, and its stock was rubbed so as to 
resemble polished mahogany." 

One of Lee's few intimates at the 
Academy was young Jefferson Davis, 
with whom he was later to be so closely 
associated. The most popular place of 
" stolen waters " for the cadets was 
" Buttermilk Falls," about two miles 
away, where they used to go and indulge 
in certain refreshments, liquid and 
40 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

otherwise, purveyed by one Benny 
Havens, who has become famous in the 
annals of West Point. Young Lee, 
Joseph and Albert Sidney Johnston re- 
fused to join in any of these clandestine 
visits to " Benny Havens, Oh " — but 
Jefferson Davis is said to have gone 
repeatedly, and to have been court- 
martialed once for drinking there. 
While trying to escape a second arrest, 
Cadet Davis fell over a cliff sixty feet 
high and was seriously hurt. 

In 1828, Robert Lee took the usual 
vacation of several months at home. 
His mother had every reason to be 
proud of her handsome soldier boy. 
She must have known then that she had 
not long to live, but she went with him 
just the same to visit friends and rela- 
tives, making the most of her oppor- 
tunities. This mid-course furlough is 
the happiest time in the life of many a 
cadet — indeed, General Grant said, 
4tl 



THE HEART OF LEE 

after he had been President of the 
United States, that this visit to his home 
and friends, from West Point, was the 
best time he ever enjoyed, because of 
the interest every one, especially the 
young ladies, take in youth dressed in 
gold lace and gilt buttons. A cousin 
of young Lee's describes his appearance 
during this furlough: 

" The first time I remember being 
struck with his manly beauty and at- 
tractiveness of manner was when he 
returned home during his course at 
West Point. He came with his mother 
and family on a visit to my father's. 
He was dressed in his cadet uniform of 
West Point gray with bullet buttons, 
and every one was filled with admira- 
tion of his fine appearance and lovely 
manners." 

Among the places visited by the 
young cadet was stately " Arlington," 
where he met the charming Miss Custis 
42 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

Avhoni he had known ever since she was 
a " sweet little girl." " Mary of Arling- 
ton " would have been more hard- 
hearted than human if she could have 
resisted the tender glances of this sol- 
dier " youth with his heart in his 
eyes " — such an earnest young man with 
such a full heart and such deep eyes ! 

Robert Lee had a special reason to 
remember this time as the happiest in 
his life, w^hen he returned to the Mili- 
tary Academy for the final year, the 
accepted lover of the daughter of 
Washington's adopted son, the grand- 
daughter of Martha Washington and 
sole heiress of the great Custis estates — 
but family and estates were of small 
moment in Robert Lee's e^^es compared 
with the love of the " dearest little girl 
in the world." 

On his return he received that 
coveted honor among cadets — the aj)- 
pointment as Adjutant of the Battalion. 
43 



THE HEART OF LEE 

His standing as a student was second in 
a class of forty-six. 

The motto on the shield of the 
Academy was, " Duty, Honor, Coun- 
try," — these three, but the " greatest of 
these " was Duty in the eyes of Robert 
E. Lee — not that he loved Honor or 
Country less, but Duty more. 

The first duty to which Lieutenant 
Lee was assigned was in the Engineer 
Corps, at Fort — usually called " Fort- 
ress " — Monroe, Virginia. Soon after 
his arrival there, he was summoned to 
" Ravensworth," a great estate in Fair- 
fax County, where his mother lay dying. 
He cared for her tenderly, never leav- 
ing her bedside till the end came. 

JMuch as he revered the memory of 
his father, he said, m later life, in almost 
the very words of Abraham Lincoln: 

" All I am I owe to my mother." 

Still, after both father and mother 
had " passed into the skies," Lieutenant 
44 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

Lee did not spend his time in repining. 
He was already too devout a Christian 
to rebel against the decree of his real 
and loving Father above. Besides, life 
in him was young, and hope and faith 
were fresh and strong. He seemed to 
have developed an in tenser affection for 
his living kindred and friends. A near 
relative wrote of a visit from him soon 
after his mother died: 

" I remember being for some time 
with him at my grandfather Ran- 
dolph's. . . . I think it was the Fall 
after he graduated. The house was 
filled with the yomig people of the 
family, of both sexes. He was very 
nmch matured since I had seen him, 
si)lendid looking, as full of fun, and 
particularly of teasing, as any of us. 

" Although we all admired him for 

his remarkable beauty and attractive 

manners, I did not see anything in him 

tliat prepared me for his so far out- 

45 



THE HEART OF LEE 

stripping all his comi^eers. The first 
time this idea presented itself to me was 
after my marriage. We were all seated 
romid the table at night, Robert read- 
ing. I looked up and my eye fell upon 
his face in perfect repose, and the 
thought at once passed through my 
mind: 

" * You certainly look more like a 
great man than any one I have ever 
seen.' 

" The same idea presented itself to 
me as I looked at him in Christ Church, 
Alexandria, during the same visit." 

Robert E. Lee's past had gone with 
the life of his beautiful, devoted mother. 
His future was to be interwoven with 
that of Mary Custis, to whom he was 
married two years after his graduation, 
in the lordly mansion at Arlington, 
overlooking the Potomac and the city 
of Washington. 

Here is the modest newsj^aper ac- 
46 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

count of that event, on which a Sunday 
paper today would lavish column after 
column: " Married, June 30, 1831, at 
Arlington House, by the Rev. IMr. 
Keith, Lieutenant Robert E. Lee, of 
the United States Corps of Engineers, 
to Miss Mary A. R. Custis, daughter 
of G. W. P. Custis, Esq." 

In spite of the brevity of this an- 
nouncement there was a gay and bril- 
liant company in the spacious rooms of 
Arlington that happy night, among the 
portraits of patriots and heroes, quaint 
Colonial furniture and other relics from 
Mount Vernon — of Martha Washing- 
ton, the bride's great-grandmother, as 
well as of the Father of his Country. 

It was not the fashion in those days 
to go away on wedding journeys, so the 
young bride and groom spent the rest 
of the lieutenant's leave of absence in 
nuptial festivities among their near rela- 
tives and friends. Then the hajjpy 
47 



THE HEART OF LEE 

benedict returned to Old Point Com- 
fort to help fortify Hampton Roads. 

At the end of four years Lieutenant 
Lee was commissioned to aid in marking 
out a boundary line between Ohio and 
Michigan. After this he was employed 
as a clerk in the engineering depart- 
ment at Washington. He was now 
enabled to live at Arlington, where that 
courtly gentleman, his father-in-law, 
was glad to keep his only daughter as 
long as possible. 

Lee was promoted to the First-Lieu- 
tenancy in 1836, During these early 
years of their married life three chil- 
dren were born. The first was named 
George Washington Custis Lee for his 
mother's father. The happy young 
father told of taking this baby boy out 
to play in the snow. The little fellow 
dropped behind, and Lieutenant Lee, 
looking back, saw him with shoulders 
squared and chin up, mimicking his 
48 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

movements, even to stretching his little 
fat legs in an attempt to step in his 
footprints. 

" When I saw this," said the fond 
father, " I said to myself, * It behooves 
me to walk very straight, when this 
fellow is already following in my 
tracks!'" 

Those were happy years in the life of 
the young couple. Lieutenant Lee was 
also fortunate in his associates in the 
national capital. Among the officers 
of his " mess " there, was a lieutenant 
familiarly called " Colonel " Joseph E. 
Johnston. 

Two years later, as Captain Lee, he 
was ordered to St. Louis to perform a 
great engineering feat. The Missis- 
sippi, in its " unvexed " course, had a 
vexatious way of changing its channel 
without much warning, to the keen 
annoyance of those who were doing 
business on its banks. Just at this time 
49 



THE HEART OF LEE 

the experts apprehended that the river 
was about to turn aside and go through 
Illinois, thus leaving St. Louis and 
many miles of river front in Missouri 
high and dry. 

So the little Eden at Arlington was 
broken up when Benedict Lee was sent 
to the then " Far West " to put the 
"Father of Waters" in a "strait- 
jacket! " He went right to work, but 
the authorities of the town, impatient 
at what they considered slow work, and 
believing the thing an impossibility, 
withdrew their part of the appropria- 
tion to pay for such a job. As Captain 
Lee had received no further instructions 
from the government, he kept on as 
though nothing had happened, saying 
calmly: 

" They can do as they like with their 
own, but I was sent here to do certain 
work, and I shall do it." 

Riots broke out in St. Louis, and a 
50 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

mob of superstitious people thought 
that young army captain was " flying 
in the face of Providence " in presum- 
ing to divert the course of one of the 
greatest rivers in the world from the 
way it wanted to go. So they threat- 
ened to drive away the ridiculous cap- 
tain and his crew. But the work was 
finished and Captain Lee was found to 
have rendered a great service not only 
to St. Louis and Missouri, but also to 
the whole country, by improving the 
navigation of the Upper Mississippi. 

Lee's correspondence at this time re- 
veals his kindness and humor. In a let- 
ter to a cousin in Alexandria, he put his 
son Fitzhugh, whom he had nicknamed 
" Rooney," against all comers in the 
baby race: 

" I wish you could undeceive her 
(*my cousin Philippa') on a certain 
point, for, as I understand, she is labor- 
ing under a grievous error. Tell her 
51 



THE HEART OF LEE 

that it is farthest from my wish to de- 
tract from any of the little Lees, but as 
to her little boy being equal to * Mr. 
Rooney ' — it is a thing not even to be 
supposed, much less believed, although 
we live in a credulous country where 
people stick at nothing, from a coon 
story to a sea-serpent! " 

To Mrs. Lee he wrote: 

" You do not know how I miss you 
and the children, my dear Mary. In 
the woods I feel sympathy with the 
trees and birds, in whose company I 
take delight, but experience no pleasure 
in a strange crowd. I hope you are all 
well and will continue so ; and therefore 
must again urge you to be very prudent 
and careful of those dear children. If 
I could only get a squeeze at that little 
fellow turning up his sweet mouth to 
*keezeBaba!'" 

Here is another letter showing the 
heart-hungry officer's deep love of cliild- 
52 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

hood, though not of his own flesh and 
blood: 

" A few evenings since, feeling lone- 
some, ... I got a horse and took 
a ride. On returning through the lower 
part of the town, I saw a number of 
little girls all dressed up in their white 
frocks and pantalets, their hair plaited 
and tied up with ribbons, running and 
chasing each other in all directions. I 
counted twenty-three nearly the same 
size. As I drew up my horse to admire 
the spectacle, a man appeared at the 
door with the twenty-fourth in his arms. 

" * My friend,' said I, * are all these 
your children? ' 

" * Yes,' he said, * there are nine more 
in the house, and this is the youngest.' 

" Upon further inquiry, however, I 
found that they were only temporarily 
his, and that they had been invited to a 
party at his house. He said, however, 
he had been admiring them before I 
53 



THE HEART OF LEE 

came up, and just wished that he had a 
million of dollars and that they were 
his in reality. 

" I do not think the eldest exceeded 
seven or eight years old. It was the 
prettiest sight I have seen in the West, 
and perhaps in my life." 

Recalled to Washington in 1840, 
Captain Lee had two more years with 
his precious little family — there were 
four children then — Custis, Mary, Fitz- 
hugh and Annie — before he was sent, 
in 1842, to Fort Hamilton, opposite 
Staten Island, to improve the defenses 
of New York Harbor. The years he 
spent here were memorable and happy 
because he was able to have his wife and 
children with him. 

One day while crossing " the Nar- 
rows " he saved a poor little black-and- 
tan terrier from drowning, and took her 
home to the children. This dog lived 
long enough to show her gratitude to 
54i 



CADET TO CAPTAIN 

the kind officer who had rescued her, by 
leaving him her dear little puppy, which 
the family named " Spec." Once after 
the wife and children had all gone home 
to Arlington for a visit, Captain Lee 
wrote to them from the fort: 

" I am very solitary, and my only 
company is my dog and cats. But 
' SiDcc ' has become so jealous now that 
he will hardly let me look at the cats. 
lie seems to be afraid that I am going 
off from him, and never lets me stir 
without him. Lies down in the office 
from eight to four without moving. 
. . . I catch him sometimes sitting 
up looking at me so intently that I am 
for a moment startled." 



$5 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

Who does i* the wars more than his cap- 
tain can 
Becomes his captain's captain. 

— Shakespeare. 

Foe years Texas had been struggling 
for independence and separation from 
Mexico. Its people succeeded in elect- 
ing a separate government, and as a 
republic it aj)plied for admission to 
the United States. This roused the 
stronger opposition of the jealous re- 
public of Mexico. Then came the 
annexation of Texas by the United 
States in 1845. This precipitated war 
with Mexico, which was declared by the 
United States government in May, 
5Q 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

1846. Both commanders-in-chief in 
this war were Virginians. The two 
men, Winfield Scott and Zachary 
Taylor, Avere exactly oj^posite in their 
natures and habits. General Taylor 
cared little for forms and precedents. 
He was so blmit and impetuous in 
action that he was nicknamed " Old 
Rough-and-Ready." 

General Scott was equally, if not 
even more, capable as a commander. 
He was a man of heroic size, but showed 
himself to be a martinet for forms and 
regulations. He had the eye of a 
matinee idol for a dramatic situation, 
and a self-conscious way of announcing 
trivial personal matters as if they con- 
cerned every one as much as himself. 
So they called General Scott, with all 
his ability and success, " Old Fuss-and- 
Feathers." 

Lee, of course, being a successful 
engineer and military man, had to be 
51 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Math the army of the United States 
when it was ready to enter Mexico from 
the North. This was to be the young 
captain's first exj)erience in the field. 
While they were waiting on the border, 
he wrote to his wife, mider date of 
October 11th, 1846, on the Rio Grande: 

" We have met with no resistance yet. 
The Mexicans who were guarding the 
passage retired on our approach. 
There has been a great whetting of 
knives, grinding of swords, and sharp- 
ening of bayonets since we reached the 
river." 

The father-heart dwelt ever upon 
those at home. He wrote to his two 
older sons — Custis was thirteen then, 
and Fitzhugh, nine — from the camp at 
Saltillo: 

" I have frequently thought that if 

I had one of you on each side of me, 

riding on ponies, such as I could get 

you, I would be comparatively happy. 

58 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

'' I have three horses. ' Creole ' is 
my pet ; she is a golden dun, active as a 
deer, and carries me over all the ditches 
and gullies that I have met with; nor 
has she ever yet hesitated at anything 
that I have put her at; she is full- 
blooded and considered the j)rettiest 
thing in the army; though young, she 
has so far stood the campaign as well 
as any horses of the division." 

He planned to write to his wife next 
day, as his Christmas celebration, but 
word came in the morning that the 
Mexicans were coming. So he wrote 
later: 

" The troops stood to their arms and 
I lay on the grass with my sorrel mare 
saddled by my side, and telescope 
directed to the pass of the mountain 
through which the road approached. 
The Mexicans, however, did not make 
their appearance. 

" Many regrets were expressed at 
59 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Santa Anna's having spoiled our Christ- 
mas dinner for which ample prepara- 
tions had been made. The little roasters 
remained tied to the tent-pins, wonder- 
ing at their deferred fate, and the head- 
less turkeys retained their plumage im- 
scathed. Finding the enemy did not 
come, preparations were again made 
for dinner. 

" We have had many happy Christ- 
mases together. It is the first time we 
have been entirely separated at this holy 
time since our marriage. I hope it does 
not interfere with your happiness, sur- 
rounded as you are, by father, mother, 
children, and dear friends. I therefore 
trust you are well and happy, and that 
this is the last time I shall be absent 
from you during my life." 

Referring to the black-and-tan dog 
he had been told was pining for his 
absent master, Captain Lee added: 

" Can't you cure poor * Spec?' Cheer 
60 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT " 

him up; take him to walk with you — 
and tell the children to cheer hmi up." 

General Taylor j)ractically ended the 
war in northern Mexico by defeating 
twenty thousand Mexicans with five 
thousand Americans at Buena Vista. 
This left a large contingent, including 
Captain Lee's, free to meet forces 
gathering for the southern campaign 
under General Scott. These met at 
Tampico and proceeded from there to 
Vera Cruz, far down on the Gulf coast, 
which city was chosen as the next scene 
of action. On his way down the coast 
the Captain wrote a long letter to Custis 
and Fitzhugh, of which this is part: 

*' Ship Massachusetts, off Lobos, 
" February 27th, 1847, 

"My dear Boys: 

" There were six thousand sol- 
diers in Tampico, . . . We only 
remained there one day. I have a nice 
61 



THE HEART OF LEE 

stateroom on board this ship. Joe 
Johnston [afterward the great Con- 
federate general, who had been a fellow- 
cadet at West Point] and myself oc- 
cupy it, but my poor Joe is so sick all 
the time, I can do nothing with him. 

" I left * Jem ' to come on with the 
horses, as I was afraid they would not 
be properly cared for. ... I took 
every precaution for their comfort, pro- 
vided them with bran, oats, etc., and had 
slings made to pass under them and be 
attached to the coverings above, so that, 
if in the heavy sea they should slip or 
be thrown off their feet, they would not 
fall. ... 

" I do not think we shall remain here 
more than one day longer. General 
Worth's and General Twiggs's divisions 
have arrived, which include the regulars, 
and I suppose the volunteers will be 
coming every day. We shall probably 
go on the first [March] down the coast, 
select a place for debarkation, and make 
all the arrangements preparatory to the 
arrival of the troops. I shall have 
plenty to do there, and am anxious for 
62 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

the time to come, and hope all may be 
successful." . . . 



At Vera Cruz Cai)tain Robert E. Lee 
became a member of " the Little Cab- 
inet," the name given to his staff and 
advisers by General Scott, who made 
no secret that he expected that a man 
of such stately presence and heroic 
achievements must in time be elected by 
a gi'ateful people. President of the 
United States. Among those around 
him were Lieutenants George B. Mc- 
Clellan, also of the Engineer Corps, 
and P. G. T. Beauregard, and many 
other officers who became great gen- 
erals at a later day. 

First they determined to lay siege to 
the city, and Engineer Lee was busy, 
day and night, for weeks. Then a joint 
attack upon it by the Army and Navy 
was decided upon. It was during these 
preparations that Robert met his 
63 



THE HEART OF LEE 

brother, Sydney Smith Lee of the 
Navy. Of the bombardment which fol- 
lowed, the Captain wrote, referring to 
his brother's conduct in it: 

" The first day this battery opened, 
Smith served one of the guns. I had 
constructed the battery and was there 
to direct the fire. No matter where I 
turned, my eyes reverted to him, and I 
stood by his gun whenever I was not 
wanted elsewhere. 

" Oh, I felt awfully, and at a loss 
what I should have done had he been 
cut down before me! I thank God he 
was saved. He preserved his usual 
cheerfulness, and I could see his white 
teeth through all the smoke and din of 
the fire. I had placed three 32 and 
three 68-pound guns in position. . . . 
The fire was terrific and the shells 
thrown from our battery were constant 
and regular discharges, so beautiful in 
their flight and so destructive in their 
64 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

fall. It was awful ! My heart bled for 
the inhabitants. The soldiers I did not 
care so much for, but it was terrible to 
think of the women and children." 

From this vicinity he wrote home 
about " Spec," the forlorn rat-terrier: 

" Tell him I wish he was here with 
me. He would have been of great 
service in telling me when I was coming 
upon the Mexicans. When I was 
reconnoitering around Vera Cruz, their 
dogs frequently told me, by barking, 
when I was approaching them too 
nearly." 

After the taking of Vera Cruz, Gen- 
eral Scott began the invasion of the 
country — to " conquer a peace," as he 
pompously announced, " in the Halls 
of the Montezumas." But at Cerro 
Gordo the Americans were met by 
Santa Anna, with his Mexican hosts. 
Scott's report of the battle which ensued 
contained this honorable mention: 
65 



THE HEART OF LEE^ 

" Reconnaissances were pushed in 
search of some practicable route other 
than the winding, zigzag road among 
the spurs of the mountains, with heavy 
[Mexican] batteries at every turn. The 
reconnaissances were conducted with 
vigor under Captain Lee at the head of 
a body of pioneers, and at the end of the 
third day a possible way for light bat- 
teries was accomplished without alarm- 
ing the enemy, giving the possibility of 
turning the extreme left of his line of 
defense and capturing his whole army, 
except the reserve that lay a mile or two 
up the road. Santa Anna said that he 
had not believed that a goat could have 
approached him in that direction. 
Hence the surprise and the results were 
the greater." 

After this battle Lee ^vrote to his 
eldest son: 

" I thought of you, my dear Custis, 
on the 18th [April, 1847] in the battle, 
6d 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

and wondered, when the musket balls 
and grape were whistling over my head 
in a perfect shower, where I could put 
you, if with me, to be safe. I was truly 
thankful you were at school, I hope 
learning to be goad and wise. You 
have no idea what a horrible place a 
battlefield is!" 

From Cerro Gordo General Scott 
advanced toward the Mexican capital, 
stopping to win battles at Contreras, 
Churubusco, Molino del Rey and 
Chapultepec. At Contreras there was 
a great lava-bed called the Pedregal. 
This has been described as " a vast sur- 
face of volcanic rocks and scoriae, path- 
less, precipitous, broken into every pos- 
sible form, presenting sharp ridges and 
deep fissures, exceedingly difficult for 
the passage, even in the daylight, for 
infantry, cavalry or single horsemen." 

This great tract was flanked by a 
swamp in such a way as to form what 
67 



THE HEART OF LEE 

the Mexicans believed to be an impene- 
trable wall in front of Contreras, which 
was defended, also, by their army. 
General Scott detailed seven officers to 
see if the Pedregal could be crossed at 
night. They reported that the place 
was absolutely impassable, night or 
day. 

Then Captain Lee offered to lead a 
detachment across that gruesome waste. 
This he did, through storm and dark- 
ness, " without light, without a com- 
panion or guide — scarcely a step could 
be taken without fear of death." 

Some time afterward. General Scott 
had occasion to testify of this exploit: 

** Captain Lee, of the Engineers, 
came to me from Contreras with a mes- 
sage. ... I think about the same 
time — midnight — he, having passed over 
the difficult ground by daylight, found 
it just possible to return on foot and 
alone to St. Augustine in the dark — 
68 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

the greatest feat of physical and moral 
courage performed by any individual, 
to my knowledge, pending the cam- 
paign." 

It would seem that nearly every re- 
port of the commander-in-chief in 
Mexico contained some allusion to 
Captain Lee's bravery and efficiency, 
showing that " he was as famous for 
felicitous execution as for science and 
daring." 

The dispatch reporting the battle of 
Chapultepec stated that he " was con- 
stantly conspicuous, bearing important 
orders from me till he fainted from a 
wound and the loss of two nights' sleep 
at the batteries." 

At the end of the campaign General 
Scott entered the beautiful City of 
Mexico in triumph, riding like a royal 
knight at the head of his army through 
the crowded streets to the " Halls of 
the Montezumas." The victorious com- 
69 



THE HEART OF LEE 

mander was not too engrossed in his 
own great achievements to forget to 
deal out well-earned praise, in the 
course of which he stated that his own 
" success in Mexico was largely due to 
the skill, valor and undaunted courage 
of Robert E. Lee, . . . the great- 
est military genius in America." 

In six months Captain Lee had been 
brevet major, brevet lieutenant-colonel 
and brevet colonel. He could well 
afford, then, to write to the once un- 
favorable George Washington Parke 
Custis, who had expressed a fear that 
his son-in-law might not receive prefer- 
ments in proportion to his merits: 

" I hope my friends will give them- 
selves no annoyance on my account, or 
any concern about the distribution of 
favors. I know how those things are 
awarded at Washington, and how the 
President will be besieged by clamorous 
claimants. I do not wish to be num- 
70 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

bered among them. Such as he can 
conscientiously bestow I shall grate- 
fully receive, and have no doubt that 
those will exceed my deserts." 

A bitter disappointment awaited 
poor, vain, kind-hearted General Scott. 
Instead of being nominated for the 
presidency, he was haled before an un- 
friendly " court of inquiry " — for polit- 
ical effect. Colonel Lee wrote of this 
indignity to his brother Smith: 

" General Scott, whose skill and 
service have crushed the enemy and 
conquered a peace, can now be dis- 
missed and turned out as an old horse 
to die!" 

It was "Old Rough-and-Ready," 
after all, who was rewarded, against his 
own wish, with the presidency of the 
United States of America, and " Old 
Fuss-and-Feathers," who so ardently 
desired and expected it, was treated 
with derision by the ungrateful people 
71 



THE HEART OF LEE 

of the country. This was not a mere 
matter of political intrigue, but of nick- 
names. For General Scott really had 
greater ability than General Taylor. 

There was a long wait, after the sur- 
render of the Mexican capital, before 
the terms of peace could be agreed upon 
so that the army could be permitted to 
go home. Colonel Lee, much as he 
yearned to be with his family after years 
of separation, made the best of this 
delay, and improved the time in every 
way he could. In the long list of now- 
familiar names of those who won their 
spurs in Mexico were: 

Albert Sidney Johnston, with a 
Texas regiment ; Braxton Bragg, Rich- 
ard S. Ewell, Edward Kirby Smith, 
A. P. and D. H. Hill, Jubal Early, 
Simon B. Buckner, James Longstreet, 
and, last, but by no means least, Jeffer- 
son Davis, who was in command of a 
Mississippi regiment. He married a 
72 



IN MEXICO WITH SCOTT 

daughter of General, afterward Presi- 
dent, Zachary Taylor. 

Joseph E. Johnston wrote of the 
tender heart of his friend Lee : 

" I saw strong evidence of the sym- 
pathy of his nature the morning after 
the first engagement of our troops in 
the valley of Mexico. I had lost a 
cherished young relative in that action. 
Meeting me, he suddenly saw in my 
face the effect of that loss, burst into 
tears, and expressed his deep sympathy 
in words as tenderly as his lovely wife 
would have done." 

Colonel Robert E. Lee returned from 
Mexico in the Spring of 1848, at the 
age of forty-one, " crowned with honors 
and covered with brevets." In one re- 
spect, at least, his home-coming was 
like that of Ulysses, for he was first 
recognized, as he rode up to the mansion 
at Arlington, by his faithful dog. Poor 
old " Spec," an object of deep solicitude 
73 



THE HEART OF LEE 

in several of his master's letters, was 
almost delirious with joy, remembering 
his long-absent friend. 

Of his home-coming Colonel Lee 
wrote from Arlington to his brother, 
now a captain in the Navy: 

" Here I am, once again, my dear 
Smith, perfectly surrounded by Mary 
and her precious children, who seem to 
devote themselves to staring at the fur- 
rows in my face and the white hairs in 
my head. It is not surprising that I 
am hardly recognizable to some of the 
young eyes around me, and am per- 
fectly unknown to the youngest. But 
some of the older ones gaze with aston- 
ishment and wonder at me, and seem at 
a loss to reconcile what they see with 
what was pictured in their imaginations. 
I find them, too, much grown, and all 
well, and I have much cause for thank- 
fulness and gratitude to that good God 
who has once more united us." 
74 



VI 

<*FEOM PILLAE TO POST»» 

The soldier's virtue rather makes choice 

of loss 
Than gain which darkens him. 

— Shakespeare. 

Although Colonel Lee had then 
lived out two-thirds of his days and was 
already laughing about his white hairs, 
he was still a young man, in the meas- 
ure of experience. He hoped to spend 
the rest of his days in peace and at home, 
leading the agreeable, useful life of the 
Virginia " gentleman farmer." 

Unconscious as Colonel Lee was of 
that likeness, there were a number of 
points of resemblance between himself 
and Colonel Washington. The real 
resemblances were more than such ex- 
ternals as that both lived in beautiful 
75 



THE HEART OF LEE 

mansions with pillared jiorticoes over- 
looking the Potomac — each sightly 
estate having fallen to his lot by in- 
heritance and the marrying of a wealthy 
wife; or that the wife of Colonel Lee 
was the granddaughter of the " agree- 
able consort " of Colonel Washington — 
for the Knight of the Nineteenth Cen- 
tury also had won his spurs, like the hero 
of the Colonial period, by the loftiest 
physical and moral courage. 

The inner likeness between the Mas- 
ter of Mount Vernon and the Man of 
Arlington shone out through their later 
careers, when Washington became the 
leader of what would have been the War 
of the Rebellion, if it had failed, while 
Lee became commander-in-chief of a 
revolution which would now be known 
as the Third War for American Inde- 
pendence if it had not proved a " Lost 
Cause." 

Lee was as far in advance of his own 
7Q 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

age as Franklin was of his time. In 
matters of the heart he was of the 
quality of Lincoln without the great 
Emancipator's eccentricity — and " sav- 
ing humor." In face and form, Lee 
was singularly blessed, j)ossessing the 
rare and manly expression of his inward 
beauty and grace, as he became the Sir 
Galahad of a higher quest than that of 
the Holy Grail. His heart was so 
clean and free from any " lurking 
root of bitterness " that, as he passed 
through the furnace of affliction, he 
grew more and more into the likeness 
of the " Man of Sorrows." If ever a 
son of man beheld the Son of Man 
in His truth and beauty, it was Robert 
Edward Lee. A New England writer, 
descended from William Bradford, 
the Puritan leader of Plymouth, after 
an earnest study into the life of 
" Lee the American," wrote of him: 
" Lee had one intimate friend — God." 
77 



THE HEART OF LEE 

It was this intimacy shining out, even 
in his earlier years, that made Robert's 
very presence, unconsciously, a con- 
victing vi^itness against an elderly " man 
of the world " whose guest he was, so 
that the old roue followed the youth to 
his room, confessed his sins and prom- 
ised to amend his life. It was his 
manifest modesty in religious expres- 
sion, which in another man would have 
sounded like cant or religiosity, that 
was accepted from him in sincerity and 
truth. 

In spite of his rueful pleasantries 
about growing old, Colonel Lee was 
now in the prime and vigor of his man- 
hood. Not quite six feet in height, he 
was so erect without and upright within 
that he seemed much taller. His wa\y, 
jet-black hair was just tinged with 
gray. His deep hazel -brown eyes were 
bright and full of animal spirits and 
humor. His ruddy complexion was 
78 



'' FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

indicative of correct life and good 
health. 

As his own father had been solicitous 
about him, so he saw to it that his boys 
learned to shoot, ride, swun, and skate. 
He called them by pet names: Custis 
was " Boo," and Fitzhugh, " Rooney.'* 

Colonel Lee was one of a commission 
of engineers in Florida the year follow- 
ing his return from Mexico, to inspect 
the fortifications along the coast and 
designate sites for new defences there. 

Next he was ordered to build Fort 
Carroll, on Soller's Point, eight miles 
below Baltimore. This kept him busy 
three years. Then, in 1852, he was ap- 
pointed Superintendent of West Point 
Military Academy. This position was 
not to his liking, but a good soldier 
obeys orders. During the three years 
of his administration there, his brother 
Smith's son, Fitzhugh Lee, and his own 
son, Custis, were among the graduates. 
79 



THE HEART OF LEE 

"Little Phil" Sheridan and " Jeb " 
Stuart were cadets at this time. 

In 1854, while Franklin Pierce was 
President and Jefferson Davis Secre- 
tary of War, two regiments of cavalry 
were added to the regular army. Al- 
bert Sidney Johnston was made Colonel 
of the Second Cavalry, with Robert 
E. Lee, Lieutenant-Colonel. After 
twenty-five years in the Engineer 
Corps, Colonel Lee was sorry to leave 
a department in which he had succeeded 
so thoroughly — but again he obeyed 
orders. He was exceedingly fond of 
horses, and this went far to reconcile 
him to the change. 

In the absence of Colonel Johnston, 
Lee took command of the Second at 
Louisville, Kentucky. The regiment 
was removed to Jefferson Barracks, a 
few miles below St. Louis, where, as 
Captain Lee, he had accomplished such 
marvels of river engineering. At " the 
80 



/'FROM PILLAR TO POST" 

Barracks " he rendered great service in 
drilling and organizing recruits. 

From St. Louis Lee was sent in com- 
mand of a detachment to Camp Cooper 
on Brazos River, Texas, to keep the 
Indians within bounds, on a wide tract, 
from the Rio Grande on the south, to 
the Arkansas river on the north, which 
has been described as an " extensive 
territory occupied exclusively by wild 
animals and Comanche Indians " — 
ferocious beasts having been mentioned 
as beings superior to those horrible 
savages! From this point Lee wrote, 
on the 12th of April, 1856: 

*' We are on the Comanche Reserve, 
with the Indian camps below us on the 
river belonging to Catumseh's band, 
whom the Government is endeavoring 
to humanize. It will be uphill work, I 
fear. Catumseh has been to see me, 
and we have had a little talk, very 
tedious on his part, and very sententious 
81 



THE HEART OF LEE 

on mine. I hailed him as a friend as 
long as his conduct and that of his tribe 
deserved it, but would meet him as an 
enemy the first moment he failed to 
keep his word. The rest of the tribe 
(about a thousand, it is said) live north 
of us, and are hostile. Yesterday I re- 
turned his visit, and remained a short 
time at his lodge. He informed me 
that he had six wives. They are riding 
in and out of their camp all day, their 
paint and ornaments rendering them 
more hideous than nature made them, 
and the whole race is extremely uninter- 
esting." 

To the ordinary settler in the South- 
west, calling a devilish Comanche 
merely " uninteresting " was " damning 
him with faint praise." He wrote of 
them that Fall: 

" Those people give a world of 
trouble to man and horse, and, poor 
creatures I they are not worth it." 
82 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

While out pursuing some savage 
renegades, he wrote to his wife: 

" I hope your father continued well 
and enjoyed his usual celebration of the 
Fourth of July; mine was spent, after 
a march of thirty miles on one of the 
branches of the Brazos, under my 
blanket, elevated on four sticks driven 
in the ground, as a sunshade. The sun 
was fiery hot, the atmosphere like the 
heat of a hot-air furnace, the water 
salt — still my feelings for my country 
were as ardent, my faith in her future as 
true, and my hopes for her advancement 
as unabated as they would have been 
under better circumstances." 

For a man who stood ready to give 
his life for his country, whenever it 
would do the least good, this was an 
unusual witness to his absolute loyalty. 
Could Nathan Hale have said more? 

Lee soon had to proceed to Ringgold 
Barracks as a member of a court- 
83 



THE HEART OF LEE 

martial. He went there on horseback 
and the journey lasted twenty-seven 
daj'-s. On September 1st, 1856, the day 
he left Camp Cooper, he wrote to Mrs. 
Lee, whose father had been concerned 
about his being promoted to a brigadier- 
generalcy recently left vacant: 

" Do not give yourself any anxiety 
about the appointment of the brigadier. 
If it is on my account that you feel an 
interest in it, I beg you will discard it 
from your thoughts. You will be sure 
to be disappointed; nor is it right to 
indulge improper and useless hopes. 
It, besides, looks like presumption to 
expect it." 

While at Ringgold Barracks, he com- 
mented in a letter home on something 
he had read in " a stray number of the 
New York Times" and added : 

*' In the same paper there are ill- 
natured strictures upon our regiment. 
They may suit themselves in everything 
8^ 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

relating to my services, and whenever 
they tell me they are no longer required, 
they will not be obtruded on them." 

From this place Colonel Lee passed 
on to Fort Brown, Texas. In spite of 
the earnest wish he had expressed years 
before, he had to spend Christmas away 
from his family. He wrote to Mrs. 
Lee on the 29th of December, 1856: 

" The steamer has arrived from New 
Orleans, bringing full files of papers 
and general intelligence from the 
* States.' I enjoyed the former very 
much. . . . We are now assured 
that the Government is in operation, 
and the Union in existence. Not that 
I had any fears to the contrary, but it 
is satisfactory always to have facts to 
go on. . . . 

". . . In this enlightened age there 

are few, I believe, but will acloiowledge 

that slavery is a moral and political evil 

in any country. ... I think it, 

85 



THE HEART OF LEE 

however, is a greater evil to the white 
than to the black race. . . . Their 
emancipation will sooner result from a 
mild and melting influence than from 
the storms and contests of fiery con- 
troversy. . . . 

" I hope you had a joyous Christmas 
at Arlington. . . . Mine was grate- 
fully but silently passed. I endeavored 
to find some little presents for the chil- 
dren in the garrison, and succeeded 
better than I had anticipated. 

" The stores are very barren of such 
things here, but by taking the week 
beforehand in my daily walks I picked 
up, little by little, something for all. 
Tell Mildred I got a beautiful Dutch 
doll for little Emma Jones — one of 
those crying babies that can open and 
shut their eyes, turn their head, etc. 
For the other two little girls. Puss 
Shirley and Mary Sewell, I found hand- 
some French teapots to match cups 
86 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

given them by Mrs. Waite; then by 
means of knives and books I satisfied 
the boys. 

" After dispensing my presents I 
went to Church; the discourse was on 
the birth of our Saviour. It was not 
as simply or touchingiy told as in the 
Bible. By previous invitation I dined 
with Major Thomas at 2 p. m. on roast 
turkey, and plum pudding. I had pro- 
vided a pretty singing bird for the little 
girl, and passed the afternoon in my 
room. God bless you all." 

Mrs. Lee had already become an 
invalid. The tender husband, thou- 
sands of miles away, attempted in a 
letter to comfort and advise her: 

" Systematically pursue the best 
course to recover your lost health. I 
pray and trust your efforts and the 
prayers of those who love you may be 
favorably answered. Do not worry 
yourself about things you cannot help, 
87 



THE HEART OF LEE 

but be content to do what you can for 
the well-being of what properly belongs 
to you. Commit the rest to those who 
are responsible, and though it is the part 
of benevolence to aid all we can and 
sympathize with all who are in need, it 
is the part of wisdom to attend to our 
own affairs. Lay nothing too much to 
heart. Desire nothing too eagerly, nor 
think that all things can be perfectly 
accomplished according to our own 
notions." 

Not liking to write gloomy letters 
home, on his return to Camp Cooper, 
Colonel Lee seized upon cats as an in- 
teresting subject, for Grandfather 
Custis was a connoisseur in those pets. 
To his youngest daughter, he wrote : 

" You must be a great personage 
now — sixty pounds ! I wish I had you 
here in all your ponderosity. I want 
to see you so much ! Can you not pack 
up and come to the Comanche country? 
88 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

I would get you such a fine cat you 
would never look at * Tom ' again. 
Did I tell you * Jim Nooks/ Mrs. 
Waite's cat, was dead? He died of 
apoj)lexy. I foretold his end. Coffee 
and cream for breakfast, pound cake 
for lunch, turtle and oysters for dinner, 
buttered toast for tea, and Mexican 
rats, taken raw, for supper. He grew 
enormously and ended in a spasm. His 
beauty could not save him. . . . 
But I saw * cats as is cats ' in Tarassa, 
while the stage was changing mules. I 
left the wildcat on the Rio Grande. 
He was too savage ; had grown as large 
as a small-sized dog, had to be caged, 
and would strike at anything that came 
within his reach. His cage had to be 
strong, and consequently heavy, so I 
could not bring it." 

While he could humor his father-in- 
law's taste for cats. Colonel Lee wrote 
of other matters when occasion de- 
89 



THE HExlRT OF LEE 

manded. During this long absence his 
son Fitzhugh was graduated at Har- 
vard, in 1857. Although " Rooney," 
as this young man was called at home, 
had not gone through West Point, Gen- 
eral Scott secured for him an appoint- 
ment as Second-Lieutenant in the army. 
When the father heard of this he wrote : 

" You are now in a position to ac- 
quire military credit, and to prepare 
the road for promotion and future ad- 
vancement. ... I hope you will 
be always distinguished for your avoid- 
ance of the universal balm, whiskey, 
and every immorality. Nor need you 
fear to be ruled out of the society that 
indulges in it, for you will rather acquire 
their esteem and respect, as all venerate, 
if they do not practise, virtue." 

A while later he wrote to the son, also 
in the Far West, on his way to the 
Pacific: 

" I cannot express the gratification I 
90 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

felt at the encomiums passed upon your 
soldiership, zeal, and devotion to your 
duty. But I was more pleased at the 
report of j^our conduct. That went 
nearer to my heart, and was of infinite 
comfort to me. Hold on to your purity 
and virtue. They will proudly sustain 
you in all trials and difficulties, and 
cheer you in every calamity. 

" I was sorry to see from your letter 
to your mother that you smoke occa- 
sionally. It is dangerous to meddle 
with. You have in store much better 
employment for your mouth. Reserve 
it, * Roon,' for its legitimate pleasure. 
Do not poison and corrupt it with stale 
vapors, or tarnish your beard with their 
stench." 

Colonel Joseph E. Johnston, being 
called to Washington to take command 
of an expedition to Utah, Lieut.-CoL 
Lee was left in charge at Camp Cooper. 
He did not remain long chief in com- 
91 



THE HEART OF LEE 

mand, for his distinguished father-in- 
law died on the 10th of October, 1857. 
As the adopted son of the Father of his 
Country, he had been venerated. He 
was a " gentleman of the old school,'' 
wealthy and hospitable. He bequeathed 
to his only daughter, Mrs. Robert E. 
Lee, the parts of Mount Vernon left to 
him in Washington's will, besides prop- 
erties which had descended to him from 
his grandfather. 

Under these circumstances there 
seems to have been no difficulty in ob- 
taining a long leave of absence for 
Colonel Lee from his Texas post. 

Among Mr. Custis's bequests were a 
large number of slaves who were to be 
set free after five years from the tes- 
tator's death. The mansion at Arling- 
ton was left to Mrs. Lee during her life, 
to go at her death to the grandfather's 
namesake, her eldest son, George 
Washington Custis Lee. With char- 
92 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

acteristic devotion, the young man when 
he heard of it in California, before his 
father could prevent it, deeded that 
grand estate to Robert E. Lee, who 
promptly but delicately declined to ac- 
cept the gift. 

Colonel Lee remained in the East un- 
til the Summer of 1859, and then re- 
turned to his post in Texas. He was 
recalled from there early in October of 
that year. He was " relieved " in a 
double sense, for the duties among the 
Comanches were irksome, though he 
performed them with faithfulness and 
without complaint. 

Directly after Colonel Lee's return 
to Arlington, Secretary of War Floyd 
called on him to lead a detachment of 
marines to Harper's Ferry, where John 
Brown, a violent abolitionist and re- 
ligious fanatic who had been engaged in 
antislavery skirmishes and killings in 
Kansas, had induced a number of 
93 



THE HEART OF LEE 

negroes and white men to join him, and 
had taken possession of the United 
States Arsenal in that village, expecting 
slaves and antislavery whites would 
flock to him there. 

Colonel Lee and his men surrounded 
the arsenal, where he found that Brown 
had taken several citizens of Harper's 
Ferry prisoners and was holding them 
as hostages against an attack. Lee sent 
Lieut. J. E. B. Stuart, who had vol- 
unteered to accompany him, with a flag 
of truce to call for the surrender of John 
Brown and his fellow conspirators. 

Brown refused, and demanded per- 
mission for his men to march out with 
their arms. This absurd proposal was 
emphatically refused by Colonel Lee. 
Then Brown threatened to kill his pris- 
oners, leading citizens of the town, 
among whom was Colonel Lewis Wash- 
ington, a grand-nephew of the first 
President, who shouted out: 
94 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

" Never mind us — fire! '' 

Stuart then raised liis hand, giving 
the preconcerted signal, and Lee's 
marines rushed into the arsenal and 
forced the door of the engine room be- 
fore Brown's men could slay the white 
prisoners. 

In February of the next year, Colo- 
nel Lee returned again to Texas as 
commander and wasted many weeks 
trying to catch a cunning Mexican 
bandit, named Cortinas. While he was 
there it was expected that he would be 
elevated to the rank of Brigadier-Gen- 
eral. Instead of this Secretary Floyd 
promoted his cousin, Joseph E. Johns- 
ton, over Lee and others who ranked 
Johnston. Colonel Lee, instead of 
being indignant at this, wrote: 

" I rejoice in the good fortune that 
has come to my old friend, Joe Johns- 
ton, for while I should not like, of 
course, that this should be taken as a 
95 



THE HEART OF LEE 

precedent in the service, yet so far as 
he is concerned, he is in every way 
worthy of promotion, and I am glad 
that he has received it." 

Extreme abolitionists in the North 
" made a martyr " of John Brown. 
Some of them expressed themselves in 
speeches which were so downright 
sacrilegious that they shocked and en- 
raged the South. A novel, " Uncle 
Tom's Cabin," written by Harriet 
Beecher Stowe, had been published 
serially years before, in " The National 
Era." The story was afterward printed 
in book form and a half-million copies 
were sold. That fiction inflamed the 
mind of the North against slavery. 
This also was bitterly resented by the 
Southern people who believed slavery 
to be unjust though there were cer- 
tain ministers who favored it as a 
" divine institution," because Noah had 
cursed his son Canaan, the father of the 
96 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

black people of Africa. Of course, 
Robert E. Lee looked upon these 
clerical advocates of slavery with dis- 
favor. It was such mistaken champions 
of slavery, in Church, in State, as well 
as among the people, who confused the 
mind of the North so that millions of 
people to this day believe that the South 
entered the Civil War to perpetuate it. 

Colonel Lee, now returned in com- 
mand of the Department of Texas, with 
headquarters at San Antonio, looked on 
in sorrow as he read in tardily received 
newspapers and the long-delayed letters 
of the coming break. To one of his 
sons he wrote from his department 
headquarters : 

" My little personal troubles sink into 
insignificance when I contemplate the 
condition of the country, and I feel as 
if I could easily lay down my life for 
its safety. But I also feel that it would 
bring little good." 

97 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Not long after this, he wrote agam: 
" Major Nichols thinks the Union 
will be dissolved in six weeks. If I 
thought so, I would return to you now. 
I hope, however, the wisdom and 
patriotism of the country will devise 
some way of saving it, and that a kind 
Providence has not turned the current 
of His blessings from us. . . . 

". . . Feeling the aggressions of 
the North, resenting their denial of 
equal rights to ovir citizens, ... I 
am not pleased with the course of the 
' Cotton States,' as they term them- 
selves. In addition to their selfish, 
dictatorial bearing, the threats they 
throw out against the * Border States,* 
as they call them, if they will not join 
them, argues little for the benefit or 
peace of Virginia, should she deter- 
mine to coalesce with them. While I 
wish to do what is right, I am un- 
willing to do what is wrong, either at 
98 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

the bidding of the South or the 
North." 

During the years of Lee's banish- 
ment the famous " Dred Scott " de- 
cision was rendered, in 1857, by Chief - 
Justice Taney of the United States 
Supreme Court. This recognized the 
property rights of slaveholders as up- 
held by the Constitution. For the 
North to consider it fair to enter any 
Southern State, to force slaveholders to 
free their slaves, was considered about 
as rank a piece of injustice as if soldiers 
from Georgia or a group of Southern 
States, which have taken an advanced 
stand on prohibition, should enter Penn- 
sylvania, with an armed force, to coerce 
its inhabitants to enact prohibition and 
practise temperance! The people of 
Pennsylvania would fight to the bitter 
end against such an invasion of their 
rights — not because they believe in 
drunkenness but in their right to deal 
99 



THE HEART OF LEE 

with such a question in their own way 
and at their own convenience. It may 
be properl}^ objected that this com- 
parison may not be parallel, yet by its 
recognition of slaves as property and of 
slavery as an institution, the Constitu- 
tion of the United States was more in 
favor of the South than with the Key- 
stone State in this assumed case. 

W^ile Lee was in Texas, Abraham 
Lincoln rose like Saul, head and shoul- 
ders above the people, and went up and 
down the State of Illinois debating with 
Senator Stephen A. Douglas, and pro- 
claiming that the country could not 
exist, " half slave and half free." Many 
an enlightened Southern man agi'eed 
with Mr. Lincoln and Colonel Lee that 
slavery was a cancer in the body politic, 
but he believed in the right of the South 
to its own opinion as to how the black 
ulcer should be removed. Was he to 
blame for believing that this could be 
100 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

done better by Southern legislation un- 
der a Constitution (like that adopted by 
the Confederate States) so that it 
should not be ruinous, nor a disaster to 
the country? Lincoln's election, by a 
minority of the Northern people, was 
regarded ominous to the South. The 
whole country began to realize that the 
*' irrepressible conflict " was at hand. 

The fires of secession were now at 
white heat. South Carolina went out 
of the Union, with colors flying, Decem- 
ber 20th, 1860. By the 1st of Feb- 
ruary, 1861, Georgia, Mississippi, 
Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and 
Texas — six other States in the so-called 
"Cotton Belt"— had followed. On 
February 4th, delegates from all these 
States except Texas, met in Mont- 
gomery, Alabama, to organize a con- 
federation of States. Lee's friend, 
Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, was 
elected President. These delegates be- 
101 



THE HEART OF LEE 

lieved that the Southern States were 
driven out of the Union by the tyranny 
of the North. 

Instead of slavery being the " chief 
corner stone " of the Confederacy, these 
delegates recognized it as an inherited 
evil and provided for its gTadual up- 
rooting. It had been made a " stone 
of stumbling" to both North and 
South. 

In February, 1861, Robert E. Lee 
was instructed to " report to the com- 
mander-in-chief at Washington." This 
order was significant. The Virginia 
Colonel reached the national capital the 
first of March, just in time to witness 
Abraham Lincoln's inauguration. 

If ever a man was between two fires 
it was Robert E. Lee, during the six 
weeks he spent at home — those first 
crucial days of Lincoln's administra- 
tion. The familiar Scriptural query 
and command, " Choose ye whom ye 
102 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

will serve ! " rang in his ears with haunt- 
ing iteration. 

" My country, right or wrong," was 
Captain Decatur's motto. " Right or 
wrong? " No, Duty never demands 
that a man do wrong. 

No one can say with truth that 
Robert E. Lee was not a great lover of 
his country. His devotion to Virginia 
was akin to his love for his own family. 
His father, who had been her governor, 
had thus expressed the intensity of his 
love for her: " Virginia is my country, 
her will I obey, however lamentable the 
fate to which it may subject me." 

No one was more far-seeing in those 
trying times than Colonel Lee. He 
saw that his beloved State, with Arling- 
ton, and the estates of his kindred all 
over the " Old Dominion," would be 
laid low by invasion of the armies of the 
North. He felt that a decision akin to 
that of Washington was now forced 
103 



THE HEART OF LEE 

upon hini. He afterward said of this 
crisis : 

" We had, I was satisfied, sacred 
principles to maintain, and rights to 
defend, for which we were in duty 
bound to do our best, even if we per- 
ished in the endeavor. . . . You 
cannot barter manhood for peace, nor 
the right of self-government for life or 
property. . . . Let us then oppose 
constancy to adversity, fortitude to 
suffering, and courage to danger, with 
the firm assurance that He who gave 
freedom to our fathers will bless the 
efforts of their children to preserve it." 

" I had no other guide, nor had I any 
other object than the defence of those 
principles of American liberty upon 
which the constitutions of the several 
States were originally founded; and 
unless they are strictly observed, I fear 
there will be an end to republican gov- 
ernment in this country." 
104. 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

The " Cotton States " already in 
secession, recognizing the leadership of 
Virginia, sent a commission to Rich- 
mond to urge that State to go with them 
and make her capital theirs. 

The firing on Fort Smnter, on the 
13th of April, and President Lincoln's 
call for troops to invade the South pre- 
cipitated Virginia's action. No doubt 
old General Scott was aware of the 
struggle going on in the heart of Lee 
and suggested to the new administra- 
tion that a word in time might save the 
greatest military genius of the coimtry 
for Northern arms. At all events, 
President Lincoln sent Francis P. Blair 
to offer Robert E. Lee the chief com- 
mand of the United States Army, 
thinking this would appeal to his ambi- 
tion as well as the common instinct of 
self-preservation. 

But Colonel Lee replied simply to 
Mr. Blair: " If I owned four million 
105 



THE HEART OF LEE 

slaves, I would cheerfully sacrifice them 
to the preservation of the Union, but to 
lift my hand against my own State and 
people is impossible." 

Blair reported his failure to tempt 
Lee, but General Scott could not give 
it up yet. He seized upon an occasion 
to persuade his former friend to accept 
the highly flattering offer. Colonel 
Lee, though he saw rule on one hand 
and ruin on the other, replied to his old 
general that he must resign : 

" I am compelled to ; I cannot consult 
my own feelings in the matter." 

Virginia, on the 17th of April, passed 
the ordinance of secession. The inter- 
view with Scott was on the 18th. All 
that day and the next — the day the 
Massachusetts troops passed through 
Baltimore on their way to invade the 
Southern States, of which Virginia 
would be the first to be attacked — 
Robert E. Lee pondered over the step 
106 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

which he feared was inevitable. If he 
could not consult his ambition, his finan- 
cial welfare, or even his personal 
preference, what could he consider? 

''Duty, then, is the suhlimest word 
in our language/' he had written to his 
own son. Duty to what — to whom? He 
went up to his room and walked the 
floor for hours. The duty to his family 
was plain. The duty to his State — that 
larger famil}^ embracing his kindred, 
the family traditions, was not that the 
higher obligation? . . . 

Soldiers were already on their way 
from the North. The President had 
called for them to march against the 
South. They would begin to attack, 
burn, frighten, insult in Virginia — and 
Arlington, his o^^^l home, would be a 
" shining mark " singled out for bay- 
onet and torch. Should he — could 
he — lead such men in an invasion of his 
native State? They might spare 
107 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Arlington and Stratford House for his 
sake, if he were their commander-in- 
chief. And "White House" on the 
Pamunkey, one of the homes of his wife, 
where George and Martha Washington 
were married — they might let that house 
stand for its century-old associations. 
But there were the homes associated 
with the memory of his mother — " Shir- 
ley," where she was born, " Ravens- 
worth," where she died — and the estates 
of his kindred, neighbors and friends — 
could he lead a Northern army to drive 
out his own people and destroy their 
homes? Monstrous! Did the invaders' 
uniforms make their quarrel just? If 
a squad of police turned housebreakers 
should he give them right of way in his 
own house? 

Yes, the State is greater than the 
family. He had no right to save him- 
self and his, and betray the State. But 
the whole Country — is that not, in the 
108 



" FROM PILLAR TO POST " 

same way, greater than the State? 
"Ay, there's the rub!" . . . 

But that "Rail-Splitter" with the 
motlej^ crew he called his Cabinet, 
backed by abolitionists and other haters 
of the South — did they constitute the 
country of Washington, Jefferson, 
Madison, Monroe, and many other 
Fathers — his Country? " No, a thou- 
sand times no! " 

It would do no good to die for such. 
But his blessed little invalid wife, his 
darling children. What kind of a man 
would he be not to stand up for and 
defend them? Were not the other 
wives and children of Virginia — of the 
whole South — just as dear to their hus- 
bands and fathers and friends? 

There was a long silence. Then a 
pleading voice was heard, ia prayer — 
God is above all — over Country, over 
State, over family. What does the 
Word say? Ah, here it is ! St. Paul's 
109 



THE HEART OF LEE 

First Letter to Timothy, fifth chapter, 
eighth verse: 

" But if any provide not for his own, 
and specially for those of his own house, 
he hath denied the faith, and is worse 
than an infidel." 

How clear it was! How could he 
have doubted. God had spoken peace 
to his soul in the stormy tempest. He 
went to his desk and wrote to the Hon. 
Simon Cameron, Secretary of War: 

" Sib: — I have the honor to tender 
the resignation of my commission as 
Colonel of the First Regiment of 
Cavalry. 

" Very respectfully, 

your obedient servant, 
" R. E. Lee/' 

Then he went down stairs, with a calm 
smile on his noble face, and said gently 
to his anxious wife: 

" Well, Mary, the question is settled." 
110 



VII 

LOYAL EVEN IN REBELLION 

Yet I argue not 
Agfainst Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a 

jot 
Of heart or hope; but still bear up and 

steer 
Right onward. 

— Milton. 

As soon as he felt that he had reached 
the right decision in that upper room 
alone with God, Robert E. Lee's heart 
was fixed. He seems never again to 
have entertained any question as to the 
rightness of his course. Even after the 
Cause seemed lost he never wavered, 
but firmly said that if he had to decide 
again he would do exactly as he did 
before. But he had not decided for 
111 



THE HEART OF LEE 

any one else. Every other man's duty 
was to be decided in the same way, be- 
tween himself and God. Yet Robert 
E. Lee recognized that God could 
s]3eak through others. That is why he 
was criticized for listening to the views 
of subordinates in his conduct of the 
war. Many of them were men of God ; 
might He not speak through them in 
matters not revealed to himself? Lee 
was different from any other general in 
this kind of open-mindedness. But 
when he was conscious of wisdom from 
on high he was as confident in disre- 
garding the advice of his best generals 
as Napoleon Bonaparte. 

He wrote that very day, April 20th, 
'61, to his brother in the Navy,, who 
followed him and fought on the Con- 
federate side: 

" The question . . • has in my 
mind been decided. ... I wished 
to wait until the ordinance of secession 
112 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

should be acted upon by the people of 
Virginia; but war seems to have com- 
menced, and I am liable at any time to 
be ordered on duty which I could not 
conscientiously perform. To save me 
from such a position, and to prevent 
the necessity of resigning under orders, 
I had to act at once and before I could 
see you again on the subject as I had 
wished. 

" I am now a private citizen, and have 
no other ambition than to remain at 
home. Save in defense of my native 
State, I have no desire ever again to 
draw my sword." 

The same day he wrote to General 
Scott: " Since my interview with you 
. . . I have felt that I ought not to 
retain my commission in the Army. I 
therefore tender my resignation, which 
I request you will recommend for ac- 
ceptance. It would have been pre- 
sented at once but for the struggle it 
113 



THE HEART OF LEE 

has cost me to separate myself from a 
service to which I have devoted all the 
best years of my life, and all the ability 
I possessed." 

To his sister, Mrs. Marshall of Balti- 
more, who shared her husband's loyalty 
to the Union, he also wrote: " I am 
grieved at my inability to see you. I 
have been waiting for a * more con- 
venient season.' We are now in a state 
of war which will yield to nothing. The 
whole South is in a state of revolution, 
into which Virginia, after a long strug- 
gle, has been draAvn; and though I 
recognize no necessity for this state of 
things, and would have forborne and 
pleaded to the end for redress of 
grievances, real or supposed, yet in my 
own person I had to meet the question 
whether I should take part against my 
native State. 

" With all my devotion to the Union, 
and the feeling of loyalty and duty of 
114 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

an American citizen, I have not been 
able to make up my mind to raise my 
hand against my relatives, my children, 
my home. . . . 

" I know you will blame me; but you 
must think of me as vou can, and be- 
lieve that I have endeavored to do what 
I thought right. To show you the feel- 
ing and the struggle it has cost me, I 
send you a copy of my letter of resigna- 
tion. I have no time for more." 

It has been argued that Lee was a 
double-dyed traitor because he used the 
education he had received at West 
Point in his defensive struggle against 
the armies of the United States govern- 
ment. Such an idea seems not to have 
entered his head when he was con- 
fronted with the sublime heart-question 
of the Duty to God, family. State and 
the country, as he saw it with the eye 
of his sublime faith. 

If he had thought merely of the pe- 
115 



THE HEART OF LEE 

cuniary cost of his education, he would 
have known that Virginia had paid her 
full quota for that. But it would never 
have struck Robert E. Lee that but few 
who have been educated at West Point 
have rendered so large and valuable 
return to the country as he had, in 
his twenty-five years of loyal service. 

Besides, West Point could make the- 
oretic generals, like McClellan, " and 
others " turned out in job lots by that 
Academy, but only God could build a 
general like Lee. Did Brienne, the 
French military school, produce Na- 
poleon Bonaparte? Yet that was more 
likely than that West Point could have 
been the making of Robert E. Lee. A 
great general, like a great poet, " is 
born, not made." Lee's genius was 
manifest in his inspired deviations from 
the academic in field tactics. He was 
far above the military martinet, he was 
the man of God. 

116 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

Two days later Lee left Arlington 
for Richmond where his presence was 
greatly desired. It was after a sad 
parting from the loved ones where he 
had " no other ambition " than to stay. 
Much as he feared the horrors of the 
war, he did not realize that his eyes 
M^ere beholding his beautiful home for 
the last time. Governor Letcher of 
Virginia had summoned him to the 
State capital where he was immediately 
appointed IMajor-General and Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the forces of Vir- 
ginia. 

He was received by the convention 
still in session. The president of that 
body closed an address to him with 
these words: 

" Yesterday your mother, Virginia, 
placed her sword in your hand, upon 
the implied condition, which we know 
you will keep to the letter and in spirit, 
that you will draw it only in defense, 
117 



THE HEART OF LEE 

and that you will fall with it in 
your hand rather than that the ob- 
ject for which it was placed there 
shall fail." 

This nomination, the unanimity of 
it, the modesty of the recipient wei^e 
almost a repetition of the honor paid to 
Colonel George Washington in Inde- 
pendence Hall, Philadelphia, on a 
similar occasion. 

General Lee replied clearly and very 
briefly : 

" Mr. President and Gentlemen of 
the Convention: Profoundly impressed 
with the solemnity of the occasion, for 
which I must say I was not prepared, I 
accept the position assigned me by your 
partiality. I would have much pre- 
ferred that your choice had fallen upon 
an abler man. 

" Trusting in Almighty God, and an 
approving conscience, and the aid of my 
fellow-citizens, I devote myself to the 
118 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

service of my native State, in whose 
behalf alone will I ever again draw my 
sword." 

Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-Presi- 
dent of the newly formed Confederacy, 
described him as he appeared on this 
occasion: 

" As he stood there, fresh and ruddy 
as a David from the sheepfold, in the 
prime of his manly beauty, and the 
embodiment of a line of heroic and 
patriotic fathers, and worthy mothers, 
it was thus I first saw Robert E. Lee. 

" I had preconceived ideas of the 
rough soldier with no time for the 
graces of life, and by companionship 
almost compelled to the vices of his 
profession. I did not know then that 
he used no stimulants, was free even 
from the use of tobacco, and that he 
was absolutely stainless in his private 
life. I did not know then, as I do now, 
that he had been a model youth and 
119 



THE HEART OF LEE 

young man; but I had before me the 
most manly and enth-e gentleman I ever 
saw." 

Instead of feeling any elation over 
the honors conferred upon him by the 
State, or recognizing any aj)proval but 
that of Heaven, Lee sent this message 
to his eldest son : 

" Tell Custis he must consult his own 
judgment, reason and conscience as to 
the course he may take. I do not wish 
him to be guided by my wishes or ex- 
ample. If I have done wrong, let him 
do better. The present is a momentous 
question which every man must settle 
for himself and upon principle." 

At other times he had told his boy: 
" There is a true glory and a true 
honor, the glory of duty done; and the 
honor of the integrity of principle." 
. . . " I know that wherever you 
are placed you will do your duty. That 
is all the pleasure, all the comfort, 
120 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

all the glory we can enjoy in this 
world." 

The letters of the anxious husband 
reveal that he knew, in his heart of 
hearts, that the struggle would be fear- 
ful and long. During the first week 
after leaving Arlington he wrote to 
Mrs. Lee that he was " glad to hear all 
is well and as yet peaceful. I fear the 
latter state will not continue long. I 
think, therefore, you had better pre- 
pare all things for removal from Ar- 
lington — that is, plate, pictures, etc., 
and be prepared at any moment. 
Where to go is the difficulty. 

" When the war commences no place 
will be exempt, in my opinion; indeed, 
all the avenues into the State will be 
the scenes of military operations. I 
wrote to Robert that I could not con- 
sent to take boys from their schools and 
young men from their colleges, and put 
them in the ranks at the beginning of 
121 



THE HEART OF LEE 

the Avar, when they are not needed. 
The war may last ten years. Where are 
our ranks to be filled from then? '* 

A few days later he repeated the 
warning to his wife: 

" I am very anxious about you. You 
have to move, and make arrangements 
to go to some point of safety which you 
must select. . . . War is inevitable 
and there is no telling when it will burst 
around you. Virginia yesterday, I 
understand, joined the Confederate 
States. What policy they may adopt 
I cannot conjecture." 

Still the distracted wife could not 
bear to leave. Her husband wrote 
again on the 8th of May from Rich- 
mond: " I received yesterday your 
letter of the 5th. I grieve at the 
anxiety that drives you from your 
home. I can appreciate your feelings 
on the occasion, and pray that you may 
receive comfort and strength in the 
122 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

difficulties that surround you. When I 
reflect upon the calamity pending over 
the country, my own sorrows sink into 
insignificance." 

Five days later he wrote her again: 
" Do not put faith in rumors of adjust- 
ment. I see no prospect for it. It can- 
not be while passions on both sides are 
so infuriated. Make your plans for 
several years of war. ... I agree 
with you in thinking that the inflamma- 
tory articles in the papers do us much 
harm. I object particularly to those in 
Southern papers, as I wish them to take 
a firm, dignified course, free from 
bravado and boasting. The times are 
indeed calamitous. The brightness of 
God's countenance seems turned from 
us. ... It may not always be so 
dark, and He may in time pardon our 
sins and take us under His protection." 

June 9th he wrote to her again in- 
forming her of the removal of the Con- 
123 



THE HEART OF LEE 

federate capital from Montgomery to 
Richmond: " You may be aware that 
the Confederate government is estab- 
lished here. Yesterday I turned over 
to it the military and naval forces of the 
State, in accordance with the proclama- 
tion of the governor, under an agree- 
ment between the State and the Con- 
federate States. I do not know what 
my position will be. I should like to 
retire to private life, so that I could be 
with you and the children, but if I can 
be of service to the State or her cause, 
I must continue. ]\Ir. Davis and all 
his Cabinet are here." 

On the 24th of May, about a month 
after Lee left home, detachments of the 
Northern army occupied the heights 
about Washington. 

General McDowell, in command, 

wi'ote to Mrs. Lee, and treated the 

family with the highest courtesy, only 

regretting the military measures which 

124. 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

required the temporary approj)riation 
of Arlington as headquarters. Later, 
in the war, after General Lee came to 
be considered an arch-rebel, Arlington 
was looted and Washington relics and 
other articles were carried off and kept 
in one of the government departments 
in the capital, and the beautiful 
estate, built by Washington's adopted 
son, was turned into a soldiers' ceme- 
tery. 

Mrs. Lee clung to her home, soon to 
belong to her eldest son who bore her 
father's name, with the heroic devotion 
of a true wife and mother, but she soon 
had the deep sorrow of parting with 
it forever. She visited relatives at 
** Ravens worth " before retiring to 
" White House," her estate on the 
Pamunkey, where Washington had 
wooed and wed her grandmother. 

Virginia soon became the stamping- 
ground of the awful game of " red-and- 
125 



THE HEART OF LEE 

black," and Mrs. Lee was forced even 
to leave the home of the Washingtons 
at the mercy of the enemy. She had 
fastened on the front door of " Wliite 
House" this placard: 

" Northern Soldiers Who Profess 
to Reverence Washington : 
Forbear to desecrate the home 
of his first married life — the 
property of his wife, now 
owned by her descendants. 

(Signed) "A granddaughter of 
Mrs. Washington" 

General McClellan appropriated 
" White House " for his headquarters, 
and one of his staff wrote under that 
war-hunted woman's appeal: 

" A Northern officer has protected 
your property in sight of the enemy." 
But Mary Custis Lee had bitter occa- 
sion to reflect that — 
126 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

" An habitation giddy and unsure 
Hath he that buildeth on the vulgar heart." 

After McClellan changed his base of 
ox^erations, some one burned that his- 
toric house! 

General Lee may have comforted 
himself with the Scripture that ** the 
tender mercies of the wicked are cruel," 
and mingled with his sorrow for his 
wife the sincere compassion of his heart 
for those Avicked enough to wish to do a 
deed like that. He was too magnani- 
mous to blame such an act upon the 
North, or hold it against General Mc- 
Clellan. 

After turning over his command to 
the Confederacy, Lee remained in 
Richmond, with the courtesy title of 
Brigadier- General, then the highest 
rank in the new Confederate service. 
He continued his labors, through his 
devotion to President Davis, as per- 
127 



THE HEART OF LEE 

sonal adviser, while preparing Southern 
men for the defense of their homes and 
States. A friend reported of his work 
up to the last of IMay — five weeks after 
taking command of the Virginia forces : 

" Lee had organized, equipped, and 
sent to the field more than thirty thou- 
sand men, and various regiments were 
in a forward state of preparation." 

On the 28th of May his duties took 
him up to Manassas, where the battles 
of Bull Run were fought later. Being 
within a few miles of " Ravensworth," 
where his mother died, and where his 
wife was then staying, he wrote a note 
to her in which he showed his delicate 
consideration for those under whose 
roof his family had found a brief 
shelter: 

" I reached here, dearest Mary, this 

afternoon. I am very much occupied 

in examining matters, and have to go 

out to look over the ground. Cousin 

128 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

John tempts me strongly to go down, 
but I never visit, for many reasons. If 
for no other, to i)revent compromising 
the house, for my visit would certainly 
be known. , . . 

" I am decidedly of the opinion that 
it would be better for you to leave, on 
your account and Cousin Anna's. . . . 
If you prefer, go to Richmond. . . . 
Otherwise, go to the upper country. 
. . . I fear I cannot be with you 
anywhere." 

How well this military " power be- 
hind the throne," and Mentor of gen- 
erals in command, did his work was soon 
demonstrated at Manassas, where, in 
what is known at the North as " the 
First Battle of Bull Run," Beaure- 
gard — on a very hot day, July 21st, 
1861 — drove the Federals under Mc- 
Dowell back to Washington. 

It is stated that the reason the Con- 
federates failed to follow up their vic- 
129 



THE HEART OF LEE 

tory and capture Washington when 
they might have done so, was because, 
at this time, the Southern leaders were 
fighting only in defense of their rights 
and homes. 

Soon after the battle of Manassas, 
General Lee wrote: 

" It was indeed a glorious victory and 
has lightened the pressure on us amaz- 
ingly. Do not grieve for the brave 
dead, but sorrow for those left behind— 
friends, relatives and families. The 
former are at rest; the latter must suf- 
fer. The battle will be repeated there 
in greater force. I hope God will again 
smile on us and strengthen our hearts 
and arms. I wished to participate in 
the former struggle, and am mortified 
at my absence. But the President 
thought it more important that I 
should be here. 

** I could not have done as well as has 
been done, but I could have helped and 
130 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

taken part in a struggle for my home 
and neighborhood. So the work is 
done, I care not by whom it is done. I 
leave tomorrow for the army in western 
Virginia." 

In that part of the Old Dominion 
many of the inliabitants were in sym- 
pathy with the North and therefore 
aided the invaders, commanded by 
"Little Mac," as General George B. 
McClellan was called. 

Soon after his arrival General Lee 
wrote from Valley Mountain, Septem- 
ber 1st, 1861, to his wife: 

" We have had a great deal of sick- 
ness among the soldiers, and those now 
on the sick list would form an army. 
The measles is still among them, but I 
hope is dying out. The constant cold 
rains, mud, etc., with no shelter or tents, 
have aggravated it. All these draw- 
backs, with impassable roads, have par- 
alyzed our efforts." 
131 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Two weeks later, he wrote again: " I 
had hoped to surprise the enemy's 
works on the morning of the 12 th, both 
at Cheat Mountain and on Valley 
River. I had taken every precaution to 
insure success, and counted on it; but 
the Ruler of the Universe willed other- 
wise, and sent a storm to disconcert the 
well-laid plan. We are no worse off 
now than before, except for the dis- 
closure of our plan. . . • 

" We met with one heavy loss which 
grieves me deeply: Colonel Washing- 
ton accompanied Fitzhugh [their son] 
on a reconnoitering expedition. . . . 
The first they knew there was a volley 
from a concealed party within a few 
yards of them. Three balls passed 
through the Colonel's body, three struck 
his horse, and the horse of one of the 
men was killed. Fitz mounted the 
Colonel's horse and brought him off. I 
am much grieved," 

132 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

A quarrel between two commanders 
in this campaign must have discouraged 
Lee more than the stormy elements and 
bottomless mud. Winter came on and 
put an end to the work, and the Con- 
federate government decided to aban- 
don that region. The Union people 
there soon withdrew and formed the 
State of West Virginia. 

The newspapers attacked Lee as an 
unsuccessful general, greatly overrated 
because of his " historical name," " fam- 
ily connections" and "showy presence." 
They sneered at his " West Point 
tactics," nicknamed him " Evacuating 
Lee," and said all he knew was to " dig 
entrenchments." 

Lee bore all these unjust taunts in 
silence. He could never defend him- 
self, especially at another's expense. 
The only selfishness he ever betrayed 
was in taking blame belonging to 
others ! President Davis afterward de- 
13d 



THE HEART OF LEE 

scribed the baffled, abused officer's re- 
turn: ** Lee came back, carrying the 
weight of defeat, and unappreciated by 
the people whom he served, for they 
could not Imow, as I knew, that, if his 
orders and plans had been carried out, 
the result would have been victory 
rather than defeat. . . . 

" Yet through all this, with a 
magnanimity rarely equaled, he stood 
in silence without defending himself or 
allowing others to defend him." 

General Lee spent that Winter in 
the South, strengthening the defenses 
and fortifying the coast so that the 
enemy could do but little damage be- 
fore the close of the war. On his 
return, in March, 1862, he saw his wife 
and daughters for the first time since 
he parted from them at Arlington 
nearly a year before. He arranged for 
them to follow him to Richmond as soon 
as McClellan's advance rendered it 
184 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

necessary for them to leave their coun- 
try home. He became, at once, Pres- 
ident Davis's military adviser. He was 
restive and anxious for active service in 
the field, and it is said that he seriously 
considered enlisting in his son Custis's 
new command as a " high private." 

No sooner had General Lee returned 
to Richmond, than his youngest son, 
Robert Junior, determined to leave the 
University and enter the service as a 
private soldier. The father consented 
to the inevitable, and wrote to the boy's 
mother: 

" I went with him to get his overcoat, 
blankets, etc. . . . God grant that 
it may be for his good. I told him of 
the exemption granted by the Secre- 
tary of War to the professors and 
students of the University, but he ex- 
pressed no desire to take advantage of 
it. ... I hope our son will make 
a good soldier." 

185 



THE HEART OF LEE 

After the disastrous Northern defeat 
at the first battle of Manassas, (Bull 
Run) President Lincoln, finding 75,000 
soldiers wholly inadequate, issued a call 
for 500,000 men to carry on the war in 
the South. These responded promptly. 
General McClellan was now in com- 
mand of the (Federal) Army of the 
Potomac, and " On to Richmond " be- 
came the Northern war-cry. McClel- 
lan and an army of 150,000 men, count- 
ing available reinforcements, had come 
up the " Peninsula," between the York 
and the James rivers, to Fair Oaks and 
Seven Pines within a few miles of the 
Confederate capital on the East, so that, 
" oft in the stilly night," the Federal 
pickets could hear the bells of Rich- 
mond. 

General " Joe " Johnston, who had 

been Lee's friend at West Point and in 

Mexico, was in command of the defense 

of Richmond in which he had been ably 

136 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

seconded by General Thomas J. — 
popularly loiown as " Stonewall " — 
Jackson, because at Manassas, General 
Bee, seeing him at his post, pointed to 
him saying: " There stands Jackson 
like a stone wall! " These daring gen- 
erals, with their brave soldiers, had 
alarmed the North to such an extent 
that many governors made stirring ap- 
peals for volunteers to save the country. 
The battle of Seven Pines and Fair 
Oaks lasted several days. President 
Davis and his military adviser, General 
Lee, rode out on June 1st, 1862, to 
watch the fighting. About sunset that 
evening. General Johnston was shot out 
of his saddle and badly wounded. The 
command was assumed by General G. 
W. Smith, next in rank. On the way 
back to Richmond, Jefferson Davis, as 
commander-in-chief of the Confederate 
Army and Navy, appointed Lee com- 
mander of the Army of Northern Vir- 
137 



THE HEART OF LEE 

ginia. Lee did not assume control next 
day but left General Smith in actual 
charge, the new commander merely 
endorsing and carrying out his sub- 
ordinate's instructions. 

An officer in Longstreet's Corps 
asked Colonel Ives of President Davis's 
staff whether Lee was possessed with 
audacity enough to command in such a 
crisis. According to Alexander, Ives 
** reined up his horse, stopped in the 
road and said, * Alexander, if there is 
one man in either army, Confederate or 
Federal, head and shoulders above 
every other in audacity, it is General 
Lee. His name might be Audacity/ " 

The new commander called his gen- 
erals together, and his meeting with 
them is said to have had somewhat the 
same effect as that of Napoleon with 
his officers at the opening of the Italian 
campaign. But there must have been 
a wide difference in one respect, for 
188 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

grizzled old General Auguereau came 
out from the presence of yoimg Bona- 
parte, hissing between his teeth: " That 
little devil makes me tremble all over! " 
Napoleon's power over men was 
largely hypnotic — and his manner often 
insulting. He had a wonderful brain; 
he w as a genius in strategy — but a mon- 
strosity, rather than a man. His in- 
fluence was strange and uncanny ; while 
Lee won the hearts of his generals as a 
man of character and a warm-hearted 
Christian gentleman. Yet in military 
genius, in bold, creative, opportune 
strokes, the best military authorities 
declare that Robert E. Lee, more than 
any other English speaking general, 
resembled Napoleon Bonaparte. Lee 
was a gentleman like Washington, with 
a heart like Lincoln's, and a strategic 
brain like Napoleon's. The Southern 
generals soon felt that the mild-man- 
nered gentleman before them was their 
189 



THE HEART OF LEE 

master. General " Stonewall " Jack- 
son, Lee's second in command, soon 
learned to know Lee so well that when 
he heard his chief criticized for being 
too deliberate, he said: " He is cautious. 
He ought to be, but he is not slow. Lee 
is a phenomenon. He is the only man 
I would follow blindfold." 

General Lee's youngest son, Robert 
E., Junior, has related an incident 
which occurred at this time: 

" The day after the battle of Cold 
Harbor, during the * Seven Days ' 
fighting around Richmond, was the first 
time I met my father after I had joined 
General Jackson. The tremendous 
work * Stonewall's ' men had performed, 
including the rapid march from the 
Valley of Virginia, the short rations, 
the bad water, and the great heat, had 
begun to tell upon us, and I was pretty 
well worn out. On this particular 
morning my battery had not moved 
140 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

from its bivouac ground of the previous 
night, but was parked in an open field 
all ready, waiting orders. Most of the 
men were lying down, many sleeping, 
myself among the latter number. To 
get some shade and be out of the wa\% 
I had crawled under a caisson, and was 
busy making up many lost hours of 
rest. 

" Suddenly I was rudely awakened 
by a comrade prodding me with a 
sponge -staff and told . . . that 
some one wished to see me. Half 
awake, I staggered out, and found my- 
self face to face with General Lee and 
his staff. Their fresh uniforms, bright 
equipments and well-groomed horses 
contrasted so forcibly with the war- 
worn appearance of our command that 
I was completely dazed. 

" It took me a moment or two to 
realize what it all meant, but when I 
saw my father's loving eyes and smile, 
141 



THE HEART OF LEE 

it became clear to me that he had ridden 
by to see if I was safe and to ask how 
I was getting along. 

" I well remember how curiously 
those with him gazed at me, and I am 
sure that it must have struck them as 
very odd that such a dirty, ragged, 
unkempt youth could have been the son 
of this grand-looking, victorious com- 
mander." 

It must have seemed very strange, 
also, that the commanding general did 
not provide an officer's rank for his 
son, but Robert E. Lee knew it was 
kinder to the son to let him win his 
spurs and earn his own rank than to 
have premature " greatness thrust 
upon '* him. 

In the strenuous time to which 
Private Robert E. Lee referred, Gen- 
eral Jackson, with only 15,000 men, had 
been moving with such celerity through 
the Shenandoah Vallej^ that they were 
142 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

called " Jackson's Foot Cavaliy." 
They had been sent to meet three gen- 
erals on their way to aid McClellan, 
who alread}^ had over 100,000 men 
ready to take Richmond. Jackson had 
prevented the three approaching detach- 
ments from getting together and had 
fought them separately, nearly destroy- 
ing those contingents numbering nearly 
three times his own compan\\ 

Knowing McClellan's habit of over- 
estimating the strength of the force he 
was to meet, Lee's first move was to 
send a large detachment as if to rein- 
force Jackson, possibly in attacking 
Washington, though this audacious 
move left him with only 25,000 men 
between the Federal army and Rich- 
mond. 

McClellan, as Lee believed he would, 

telegraphed President Lincoln that 

Lee was confronting him with 200,000 

men — about twice the number of his 

143 



THE HEART OF LEE 

own forces. A general, to be success- 
ful, must understand his antagonist 
and anticipate the moves he will make. 
So Lee's next move was to find out 
just the strength of McClellan's right 
wing and how it was disposed. 

There was another well-known 
" Bible Christian " soldier among the 
men of Lee's army — General J. E. B. 
(nicknamed "Jeb") Stuart. He 
started out from Richmond, on the 11th 
of June, with 1,200 cavalry, and made 
a detour, breaking down the feeble op- 
position they encountered, destroying 
Federal supplies and railroad com- 
munications, besides noting the lay of 
the land as he hurried along. Finding 
that he was pursued and that he could 
not return by the way he had come, 
Stuart rode on, night and day, and 
made the circuit of McClellan's entire 
army, with the loss of only one man! 

This was one of the most brilliant cav- 
144 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

airy exploits in histoiy, and it reflected 
as much discredit upon McClellan as 
credit upon " Jeb " Stuart and Lee. 

The new commander, at a great loss 
of men, crushed McClellan's right, as 
he intended, in a series of engage- 
ments — from Gaines's Mill to Malvern 
Hill, called the "Seven Days Bat- 
tles " — by which McClellan was driven 
down the James and found refuge 
within range of the Federal gunboats 
at Harrison's Landing. 

Thus, in less than one month. Gen- 
eral Lee had driven McClellan's great 
army out of his intrenchments, and, for 
a time at least, had raised the siege of 
Richmond. 

Nothing but defensive warfare was 
expected of General Lee, but he saw 
that the offensive was the best de- 
fensive — and it proved " offensive " 
enough to the Northern people. 

McClellan and his army were recalled 
145 



THE HEART OF LEE 

to Washington, for Lee's surx3rising 
evolutions had thoroughly alarmed the 
authorities there. Old General Halleck, 
now Commander-in-Chief of the Fed- 
eral armies, decided to send out General 
Pope, who had been successful in the 
West, with the remnant commands of 
three Generals, Fremont, Banks and 
McDowell. 

Being assigned to complete a difficult 
task in which so accomplished a general 
as McClellan had failed, seems to have 
turned poor Pope's head. He issued 
boastful orders from his " head- 
quarters in the saddle," announcing 
that such obsolete terms as " base of 
supplies " and " lines of retreat " were 
to be dropped forthwith from " the 
bright lexicon " of his heroic deeds! 

The Southern commander, amused 

and disgusted, wrote to Mrs. Lee: 

" Tell Rob to catch Pope, and also to 

bring his cousin, Louis Marshall, who, 

146 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

I am told, is on his staff. I could for- 
give the latter fighting against us, but 
not his joining Pope! " 

Young Marshall was Lee's Balti- 
more sister's son, whose father was a 
Union man. Another time, on hearing 
that his Federal nephew was looking 
wretched, he wrote: " I am sorry he is 
in such bad company, but I suppose he 
could not help it." 

More than a year before. General 
Lee had predicted that another engage- 
ment, in greater numbers, would have to 
be fought at Manassas. The fulfilment 
of his prophecy was at hand, but in- 
stead of being detained in Richmond 
as before, Lee was now chief in com- 
mand. 

To meet Pope and his three contin- 
gents made it necessary to bring to- 
gether with himself, both Jackson and 
Longstreet. There was much sparring 
and fencing, before the great engage- 
147 



THE HEART OF LEE 

nient, during which the commander on 
each side learned, by accident, the 
other's plan of camj)aign. Lee here 
resorted to Washington's strategic spe- 
cialty of changing his scheme so that 
Pope's discovery, instead of being a 
revelation, proved only a delusion. 

General Pope showed real ability 
along some lines, but seemed quite 
lacking in others. Instead of prevent- 
ing the junction of Jackson Avith Long- 
street by fighting them separately, he 
sent a dispatch to Halleck in Washing- 
ton that he was going to " bag the 
whole crowd." Instead of keeping Lee 
from getting through Thoroughfare 
Gap, as he should have done at all 
hazards, he allowed him to come, cut 
off his " base of supplies " and the three 
coalesced to " bag " the bragging " bag- 
ger." 

" They fought like brave men, long 
and well," but it was too late. Pope 
148 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

battled valiantly, but he had blundered 
in the planning. Even while his men 
were following their obsolete " lines of 
retreat " toward Washington, Pope 
was telegraphing Halleck that they 
were Avinning the victory, and promis- 
ing that he would do great things on the 
morrow. When he found no chance 
to fight next daj^ Pope retired to 
Washington, and resigned his com- 
mand. 

As after the first defeat at Bull Run 
President Lincoln now issued another 
call for volunteers, and men came 
marching southward from all directions 
to the refrain: 

" We are coming, Father Abraham, 
Three hundred thousand more." 

Lee now decided to carry his offen- 
sive-defensive into the North. Virginia 
had been forced by position and circum- 
stances to bear the terrible burden of 
U9 



THE HEART OF LEE 

the war. So he issued a proclamation 
to the lovers of right and liberty in 
Jlaryland, hoping thus to gain posses- 
sion of Baltimore and attack Phila- 
delphia. 

Singing " Dixie " and " Maryland, 
My Maryland," the Confederate army 
crossed into Maryland at Harper's 
Ferry. In that part of the State, as in 
Western Virginia, the Union sentiment 
prevailed, and the people were not in- 
clined to rally round the banner of the 
" Southern Cross." 

Lee's men were half-starved, bare- 
footed and ragged. The JNIarylanders 
refused to give or even to sell them the 
fruits wasting on the ground, or any 
other provisions. To enforce his strict 
rule against foraging, Lee ordered a 
soldier shot for stealing a pig. 

To feed and clothe his army, Lee 
detached " Stonewall " Jackson to cap- 
ture Harper's Ferry, which he did after 
150 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

a sharp encounter, on the 15th of Sep- 
tember, thus procuring food, clothing 
and arms. What the Army of North- 
ern Virginia most needed now was 
horses. 

After Pope's defeat at Bull Run 
General McClellan was again placed 
in command of the Army of the Poto- 
mac, for President Lincoln hoped he 
might strive with " a fervor now acute " 
and " haply compensate for old de- 
lay." 

McClellan might have intercepted 
Lee before he could enter Maryland. 
Though his progress was more rapid 
than ever before, he did not reach Har- 
per's Ferry in time to save it from the 
Confederates. They were now well 
fed, clothed and equipped to meet him 
near Sharpsburg, at Antietam Creek, 
by the name of which the North called 
the battle that ensued. 

It was a terrible conflict — the bloodi- 
151 



THE HEART OF LEE 

est for the time it lasted, according to 
most authorities, in the war between the 
States. The slain lay in long heaj)s of 
blue and gray, like windrows in a new- 
mown hay-field. 

Young Robert Lee writes of meeting 
his father in this battle: 

" As one of the Army of Northern 
Virginia, I occasionally saw the Com- 
mander-in-Chief . . . but ... at 
the battle of Sharpsburg . . . our 
battery had been severely handled, los- 
ing many men and horses. . . . 

" General Lee was dismounted. . . . 
I went up to my father . . . and 
said : 

" ' General, are you going to send us 
in again? ' 

" * Yes, my son,' he replied with a 
smile ; * you must all do what you can 
to drive these people back.' . . . 

" He was much on foot during this 
part of the campaign, and moved about 
152 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

either in an ambulance, or on horse- 
back, with a courier leading his horse. 
An accident, which temporarily dis- 
abled him, happened before he left Vir- 
ginia. He had dismounted and was 
sitting on a fallen log, with the bridle 
reins hung over his arm. * Traveler,' 
becoming frightened at something, sud- 
denly dashed away, threw him violently 
to the ground, spraining both hands 
and breaking a small bone in one of 
them." 

It was many weeks before General 
Lee could use his hands, or sign his 
name, but he never blamed the horse, 
for " Traveler " and he were friends. 
The master would whisper affection- 
ately in the horse's ear, and the intelli- 
gent animal would nod his head as if 
he understood every word. 

The battle of Sharpsburg, or An- 
tietam, was counted a triumph by the 
North, because Lee's invasion of Mary- 
153 



THE HEART OF LEE 

land was stopped, so President Lincoln 
issued his Emancipation Proclamation, 
which he had held back for a Northern 
victory. Lee was not driven back from 
Maryland, however, for he waited five 
weeks before crossing the Potomac into 
Virginia, hoping that McClellan would 
give him another chance to fight him. 
But that general was either too timid 
or too tired. During this time " Jeb " 
Stuart repeated his former feat of rid- 
ing around the entire Federal army, 
this time capturing 1,000 horses greatly 
needed for the Southern cavalry and 
artillery service. It was this raid, after 
getting full supplies at Harper's Ferry, 
that enabled Lee to win the great bat- 
tles which followed. 

McClellan's failure to follow up the 
drawn battle at Sharpsburg (Antie- 
tam) and his allowing Stuart to ride 
around his army again, raised popular 
clamor at the North to such a pitch that 
I54t 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

he was permanently removed from the 
command. 

General Burnside was now appointed 
to command the Army of the Potomac 
in place of McClellan. He recom- 
mended making a dash for Richmond 
by way of Fredericksburg. 

Lee and Jackson had separated 
again, " Stonewall " having been sent 
back to the Valley of Virginia. While 
in camp near Winchester, an officer 
received his orders, in regular form, 
from the commander-in-chief and left 
to attend to their execution. Return- 
ing unexpectedly, he was surprised and 
pained to find General Lee kneeling 
beside his little bed, sobbing as if his 
heart were breaking, holding in his hand 
a letter which told of the death of his 
daughter Annie in North Carolina. He 
had received the letter earlier but con- 
trolled himself for the routine work of 
the morning, and now at last, he was 
155 



THE HEART OF LEE 

alone to talk it over with his most inti- 
mate Friend. 

Lee, having learned of the Federal 
design, intrenched himself on the hills 
around Fredericksburg, which he de- 
fended with 78,000 men against Burn- 
side with 116,000. The Federals began 
the attack on the 11th of December, 
1862, and after a terrific conflict, were 
defeated with great loss, on the 13th. 
The Southern commander wrote on the 
16th: 

" This morning they were all safe on 
the north side of the Rappahannock. 
They went as they came — in the night. 
They suffered heavily as far as the bat- 
tle went, but it did not go far enough 
to satisfy me. Our loss was compara- 
tively slight, and I think will not exceed 
two thousand." 

On the 25th — another Christmas 
away from home — Lee wrote to his 
daughter: 

156 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

" I cannot tell you how I long to see 
you when a little quiet occurs. My 
thoughts revert to you, your sisters and 
your mother, my heart aches for our 
reunion. Your brothers I see occa- 
sionally. ... I have no news, 
confined constantly to camp, and my 
thoughts occupied with its necessities 
and duties. I am, however, happy in 
the knowledge that General Burnside 
and army will not eat their promised 
Christmas dimier in Richmond to- 
day. . . . 

" What should have become of us 
without His crowning help and protec- 
tion? Oh, if our people would only 
recognize it and cease from vain self- 
boasting and adulation, how strong 
would be my belief in final success and 
happiness to our country ! " 

It was while at Fredericksburg that 
General Lee freed all the slaves left 
to him as executor of the estate of his 
157 



THE HEART OF LEE 

father-in-law, George Washington 
Parke Custis, as provided in the will, 
five years before. 

General Burnside also was removed 
after his defeat at Fredericksburg, and 
General Joseph — popularly known as 
" Fighting Joe " — Hooker was ap- 
pointed to lead the Army of the Po- 
tomac. The two armies remained fac- 
ing each other all that " long and dreaiy 
Winter." On the dav after Wash- 
ington's Birthday, General Lee wrote 
home from " Camp Fredericksburg:" 

" The weather is now very hard upon 
our poor bushmen. This morning the 
whole country was covered with a 
mantle of snow fully a foot deep, . . . 
and our poor horses were enveloped. 
We have dug them out, . . . but 
it will be terrible, and the roads im- 
passable. ... I fear our short, 
rations for man and horse will have to 
be curtailed. 

158 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

" Our enemies have their troubles 
too. They are very strong immediately 
in front. ... I owe Mr. F. J. 
Hooker no thanks for keeping me here. 
He ought to have made up his mind 
long ago what to do." 

The engagement at Chancellorsville, 
fought a few miles north of Fredericks- 
burg, May 1st to 4th, 1863, was Lee's 
greatest battle. So great was the con- 
fidence of the David and Jonathan of 
the Southern Cause, by this time, that 
when " Stonewall " Jackson sent to 
Lee for orders the commanding general 
replied: " Say to General Jackson that 
he knows just as well what to do with 
the enemy as I do." 

Captain Robert E. Lee has written 
of the general grief over the loss of 
General Jackson, who had thoughtlessly 
gone in front of the firing line and was 
shot by his own men: " The joy of our 
victory at Chancellorsville was sad- 
159 



THE HEART OF LEE 

denecl by the death of * Stonewall ' 
Jackson. His loss was the heaviest 
blow the Army of Northern Virginia 
ever sustained. To Jackson's note tell- 
ing him he was wounded, my father 
replied: 

"... * Could I have directed 
events, I should have chosen, for the 
good of the country, to have been dis- 
abled in your stead. I congratulate you 
on the victory, which is due to your 
energy.' 

" Jackson said, when this was read 
to him: * Better that ten Jacksons 
should fall than one Lee ! ' 

" Afterward, when it was reported 
that Jackson was doing well, General 
Lee playfully sent him word: 

" ' You are better off than I am, for 
while you have only lost your left, I 
have lost my right arm.' 

" Then, hearing that he was worse, 
he said: 

160 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

" * Tell him that I am praying for 
him as I believe I have never prayed 
for myself.' " 

The night after the Northern defeat 
at Chancellorsville was, according to 
President Lincoln's secretary-histori- 
ans, the darkest of all in the terrible 
war. Abraham Lincoln spent his time 
walking the floor, tm^ning his ashy-pale 
face toward Heaven and crying out: 
" O what will the country say! " 

Lincoln, like Lee, was a firm believer 
in j)rayer. He was speaking a little 
later of an experience he had in con- 
nection Avith this awful defeat. After 
Lee started North again and was in- 
vading Pennsylvania, President Lin- 
coln said: 

" OjDpressed by the gravity of our 
affairs, I went to my room one day, 
locked the door, and, getting down on 
my knees before Almighty God, I 
prayed to Him mightily for victory at 
161 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Gettysburg. I told Him this was His 
war, and our cause His cause, but we 
couldn't stand another Fredericksburg 
or Chancellorsville. I then and there 
made a solemn vow to Almighty God 
that if He would stand by our boys at 
Gettysburg I would stand by Him." 

To the Army of Northern Virginia, 
which had noAV become a great praying 
band, the loss of " Stonewall " Jackson 
was more than a calamity; it was a 
" dispensation of Providence." This 
made them more anxious about their be- 
loved commander. When General Lee 
would ride along in front to inspire 
his men they pointed their guns down 
and shouted — their deep bass sounding 
like the voice of thunder: 

"Go back, Lee!" "Lee to the 
rear! " 

They refused to fire a shot until their 
general had retired to a place of safety, 
which, to their minds, was the only 
162 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

" point of vantage " for him. The Com- 
mander-in-Chief exclaimed, after one of 
these remonstrances: " I wish some one 
would tell me my proper place in battle. 
I am always told I should not be where 
lam!" 

On the 9th of June, General Lee's 
son Fitzhugh was wounded in a skir- 
mish; he was sent to " Hickory Hill," 
an estate about twenty miles from Rich- 
mond, to recover. His wound was heal- 
ing when a group of Northern cavalry- 
men came and carried him away before 
the eyes of his astonished wife and rela- 
tives. He was removed, at mortal risk, 
to " Fortress " Monroe. General Lee 
wrote to his indignant and distressed 
daughter-in-law : 

" You must not be sick while Fitz- 
hugh is away, or he will be more restless 
under his separation. Get strong and 
hearty by his return. . . . 

" I can appreciate your distress. . . . 
163 



THE HEART OF LEE 

I deeply sympathize with it, and in the 
lone hours of the night, I groan in sor- 
row at his captivity and separation from 
3'ou. . . . 

" I can see no harm that can result 
from Fitzhugh's capture, except his 
detention. . . . He will be in the 
hands of old army officers and surgeons, 
most of whom are men of j)rinciple and 
humanity. . . . Nothing would do 
him more harm than for him to learn 
that you were sick and sad. How could 
he get well? So cheer up and prove 
your fortitude and patriotism." 

But the daughter-in-law grew ill and 
worse, and when the word came to her 
husband that she was dying, he applied 
to General Butler, now in command 
there, to let him go to her for forty- 
eight hours, for his brother Custis, of 
equal rank, had offered to take Fitz- 
hugh's place as a hostage. This request 
was curtly denied, and the wife died 
164 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

calling for her captive husband. Gen- 
eral Lee wrote of this to his wife: 

" I grieve for our lost darling as a 
father only can grieve for a daughter, 
and my sorrow is heightened by the 
thought of the anguish her death will 
cause our dear son, and the poign- 
ancy it will give to the bars of his 
prison." 

Even then there was no word of bit- 
terness against Butler, the most hated 
Northern general in all the South, be- 
cause of his infamous " Woman Order," 
which was taken as an insult to the 
ladies of New Orleans, and other " high 
crimes and misdemeanors " in Southern 
eyes. 

In June, 1863, Lee was again in the 
North, this time in Pennsylvania. In 
his " General Orders " issued June 
27th, 1863, he announced: 

" The commanding general consid- 
ers that no greater disgrace could befall 
165 



THE HEART OF LEE 

the army, and through it our whole 
people, than the j)erpetration of the 
barbarous outrages upon the mnocent 
and defenseless, and the wanton de- 
struction of jDrivate property, that have 
marked the course of the enemy in our 
countrJ^ ... It must be remem- 
bered that we make war only uj)on 
armed men, and that we cannot take 
vengeance for the wrongs our i)eople 
have suffered without lowering our- 
selves in the eyes of all whose abhor- 
rence has been excited by the atrocities 
of our enemy, and offending against 
Him to whom vengeance belongeth, and 
without whose favor and support our 
efforts must all prove in vain." 

The story of Gettysburg, the greatest 
conflict that ever took place on the 
American continent, and counted 
among the ** fifteen decisive battles " of 
history, is too well known to be repeated 
here. It was called " the high- water 
166 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

mark " of the Civil War and was fought 
on a field containing twenty-five 
square miles, around Gettysburg, a lit- 
tle to\Mi in southwestern Peimsylvania, 
near the Maryland line, July 1st, 2nd 
and 3d, 1863. 

Hooker had given place to General 
JNIeade, the fifth commanding general 
the North had sent against Lee, who 
had beaten four. Everything seemed 
to favor the Southern arms, except that 
General James Longstreet was second 
in command, in " Stonewall " Jackson's 
place. The Army of Northern Virginia 
never fought with more signal bravery. 
Pickett's charge was one of the most 
heroic in all history — outvying in num- 
bers and ratio of loss the Charge of the 
Light Brigade at Balaklava. 

The engagement was precipitated on 

the first day before Lee was ready, and 

there was much sparring and struggling 

for position. That night there was a 

167 



THE HEART OF LEE 

him after Montereau — " It was not 
fifty little boats I needed — only twenty 
— only twenty! " The difference was 
in Napoleon's belief in his fate — Lee's, 
in his faith. The Confederate general, 
however, admitted, privately to a 
friend, years after the war: 

" If I had had ' Stonewall ' Jackson 
at Gettysburg, I would have won that 
battle, and a victory there would have 
given us Washington and Baltimore, 
and would have established the inde- 
pendence of the country." 

Long after the war a Northern 
Grand Army man told of meeting Lee 
in the field of Gettysburg under cir- 
cumstances which revealed to him the 
true heart of the Southern commander: 

" I had been a most bitter anti- South 
man, and fought and cursed the Con- 
federates desperately. I could see 
nothing good in any of them. The last 
day of the fight I was badly wounded. 
170 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

A ball shattered my left leg. I lay on 
the ground not far from Cemetery 
Ridge, and as General Lee ordered his 
retreat, he and his olSicers rode near 
me. 

" As they came along I recognized 
him, and, though faint from exposure 
and loss of blood, I raised up my hands, 
looked Lee in the face, and shouted as 
loud as I could — ' Hurrah for the 
Union!' 

" The General heard me, looked, 
stojDped his horse, dismounted and 
came toward me. I confess I at first 
thought he meant to kill me. But as he 
came up he looked down at me with 
such a sad expression upon his face that 
all fear left me, and I wondered what 
he was about. He extended his hand 
to me, grasping mine firmly, and look- 
ing right into my eyes, said : 

" * My son, I hope you will soon be 
well.' 

171 



THE HEART OF LEE 

" If I live a thousand years I shall 
never forget the expression on General 
Lee's face. There he was, defeated, 
retiring from a field that had cost him 
and his cause almost their last hope, 
and yet he stopped to say words like 
these to a wounded soldier of the op- 
position who had taunted him as he 
passed by ! As soon as the General had 
left me I cried myself to sleep there on 
the bloody ground." 

That look of General Lee's produced 
the same result as that of his Lord who 
only " looked on Peter," and he 

" Did quail and fall . . . 
And went out speechless from the face 

of all 
And filled the silence, weeping^ bitterly." 

Lee's feeling toward the Boys in 

Blue was like that of Lincoln for Boys 

in Gray. He never expressed himself 

unkindly against the enemy. He re- 

172 



LOYAL m REBELLION 

ferred to them as " those people," and 
the worst thing he said against them 
was, ** I wish they would stay at home 
and attend to their ovm affairs, and let 
us do the same 1 " 

No one knew better than Lee, as he 
marched down from Gettysburg, that 
the Cause was now losing ground. 
Could Longstreet have been right after 
all? Sincerely feeling that a younger 
man might retrieve the great loss and 
yet win the Cause, he tendered his 
resignation as commander. But Presi- 
dent Davis refused to receive it, saying 
it would be an impossibility to find a 
general " more fit to command or who 
would possess more of the confidence 
of the army." 

The brave fellows were barefooted 
once more, and ragged and hungry. It 
was a bitter experience for Lee to 
return to war-ridden, impoverished Vir- 
ginia for another Winter. He had 
173 



THE HEART OF LEE 

" If I live a thousand years I shall 
never forget the expression on General 
Lee's face. There he was, defeated, 
retiring from a field that had cost him 
and his cause almost their last hope, 
and yet he stopped to say words like 
these to a wounded soldier of the op- 
position who had taunted him as he 
passed by ! As soon as the General had 
left me I cried myself to sleep there on 
the bloody ground." 

That look of General Lee's produced 
the same result as that of his Lord who 
only " looked on Peter," and he 

" Did quail and fall . . . 
And went out speechless from the face 

of all 
And filled the silence, weeping bitterly." 

Lee's feeling toward the Boys in 

Blue was like that of Lincoln for Boys 

in Gray. He never expressed himself 

unkindly against the enemy. He re- 

172 



LOYAL LST REBELLION 

f erred to them as " those people," and 
the worst thing he said against them 
was, " I wish they would stay at home 
and attend to their o^vn affairs, and let 
us do the same ! " 

No one knew better than Lee, as he 
marched down from Gettysburg, that 
the Cause was now losing gi'ound. 
Could Longstreet have been right after 
all? Sincerely feeling that a younger 
man might retrieve the great loss and 
yet win the Cause, he tendered his 
resignation as commander. But Presi- 
dent Davis refused to receive it, saying 
it would be an impossibility to find a 
general " more fit to command or who 
would possess more of the confidence 
of the army." 

The brave fellows were barefooted 
once more, and ragged and hungry. It 
was a bitter experience for Lee to 
return to war-ridden, impoverished Vir- 
ginia for another Winter. He had 
178 



THE HEART OF LEE 

twice left that destitute State partly for 
the sake of its devoted people who suf- 
fered most of all in being unable to 
give necessary assistance to him and 
his gallant army. 

Lee wrote to his wife and daughters 
to get them to double their already 
great exertions in knitting stockings 
for the men. In the winter of 1863-4 
Lee and his heroes suffered similar 
privations to those of Washington's 
terrible Winter at Valley Forge. Cap- 
tain Robert Lee wrote of this season of 
suffering: " There was at this time a 
great revival of religion in the army. 
IMy father became very much interested 
in it, and did all he could to promote in 
his camps all sacred exercises." 

His son Fitzhugh was released in 
April, 1864, through an exchange of 
prisoners. General Grant came that 
Spring from his triumphs in the 
West — the sixth general to take com- 
174 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

niand of the Army of the Potomac. 
His policy was to wear out and starve 
the Confederates. He had a splendidly 
equipped army, sometimes several times 
the number of Lee's ragged followers, 
and even then he kept sending for re- 
inforcements, w^hich were always on the 
way from the North. 

Others than General Lee had begun 
to see " the beginning of the end," 
for the fact was, the South was not 
only bankrupt, but had no more men 
to fill up its sadly thinning ranks. 
Yet the Chief gave no sign of waver- 
ing. 

" It becomes no man to nurse despair 
But in the teeth of clenched antagonisms 
To follow up the worthiest till he die." 

His faith in God and the righteous 

Cause was still strong. It led him, like 

Moses, through the Wilderness against 

Grant, but, at the battle of Spottsylva- 

175 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Ilia General " Jeb " Stuart, his Chief 
of Cavalry, and strong brother and 
helper in the Christ-life, was slain. 

Soon after this General Lee was 
seriously ill on the North Anna, and it 
was feared that he also might be taken 
from the leadership of the army. But 
he grew better soon and went on fight- 
ing with grim determination, his invin- 
cibles, only half as many men as Grant, 
making the dear-bought Federal vic- 
tories cost double their oa^ti great 
losses. No commander ever loved his 
men more than Lee, and no general 
ever had a greater right to love them. 
He had said that he had the best army 
in the world, and it was doubly hard to 
lose his men now. 

There was a terrible struggle around 
Petersburg, which Grant mined and 
blew up, but even in that sudden, 
ghastly conflict, known as the " Battle 
of the Crater," Grant, after many 
176 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

months of preparation, lost more men 
than Lee. There was a long, hard 
siege, and the few starving Confederates 
were overwhelmed by a mighty army 
from the North. 

Meanwhile Sheridan was sent into 
the Valley to drive out General Early, 
who had threatened and frightened 
Washington. Sheridan, carrying out 
Grant's policy, burned two thousand 
barns filled with grain, seventy mills of 
flour and wheat, and drove away almost 
all the cattle and other live stock that 
was left. To the poor Virginians Grant 
seemed a butcher, and Sheridan, a 
demon — especially when he reported to 
his chief: " A crow flying across the 
Valley will have to carry its own ra- 
tions." 

Before Petersburg fell, Lee warned 

President Davis to make his escape 

from Richmond. Even then they 

planned to meet farther South. But 

177 



THE HEART OF LEE 

Grant and Sheridan were able with un- 
limited resources to surround Lee, and 
the long, stern chase ended at Appo- 
mattox, about fifty miles west of Rich- 
mond. 

Lee's army had been marching along 
Appomattox Creek like a company of 
military tramps, munching parched 
corn. Thanks to Grant and Sheridan, 
there was nothing to eat in the country, 
and now they had captured the train of 
supplies which had been sent, for Lee's 
desperate need, to Appomattox Court 
House. 

A Southern corps commander ap- 
proached his leader to intimate that it 
would be a physical impossibility for the 
men to march more than a day or two 
longer without rations, and suggested 
the terrible alternative — surrender or 
starve. 

Robert E. Lee's deep hazel eyes 
flashed as he replied: " Surrender! I 
178 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

have too many good fighting men for 
that!" 

The quemlous general backed out of 
his commander's presence abashed. 
Then another proposed that they dis- 
band and escape to the mountains and 
by guerrilla warfare, badger the enemy 
for many years. Lee thought of the 
families of his faithful Christian sol- 
diers longing for them to come home 
even as his own dear ones wished to see 
his face again. It was a terrible alter- 
native. 

As they marched along, Lee riding 
" Traveler," he pondered earnestly. 
They saw his lips move and knew he 
was talking with his best Friend. 

What should he do? " Is His mercy 
clean gone forever?" Had the " Friend 
that sticketh closer than a brother " 
failed, and forsaken him after all? Had 
He not promised Joshua in the wilder- 
ness — " As I was with Moses, so I will 
179 



THE HEART OF LEE 

be with thee; I will not fail thee nor for- 
sake thee? " 

The white, sad face seemed uncon- 
scious of those near him. 

. . . Worse than death? Worse 
than a thousand deaths! How blest 
and happy " Jeb " and " Stonewall " 
are now! 

" How easily I could get rid of this 
and be at rest! I have only to ride 
along the line and all would be over. 
But it is our duty to live. What will 
become of the women and children of 
the South if we are not here to protect 
them? . . ." 

They laughed and jeered at Him, 
taunting Him with failure. " The 
servant is not greater than his 
Lord." . . . 

He looked around. The men seemed 

dispirited and out of sorts. Even 

" Traveler " stepped less proudly than 

usual. He thought of the humilia- 

180 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

tion — of the pride of family, of the 
State, and of the whole South. It had 
done all that it could — and lost — 
failed! . . . 

" Lord, what wilt Thou have me to 
do?" 



They found themselves headed off — 
Grant had intercepted a letter sent to 
Davis outlining their plan of escape. 
They were surrounded. 

Grant had written to discuss a sur- 
render — to " save further effusion of 
blood," he suggested. As soon as Lee 
saw how completely they were hemmed 
in, he said: 

" There is nothing left but to go to 
General Grant, and I would rather die 
a thousand deaths." 

A member of his staff, unconscious of 
all that had been passing in the mind 
of the chief, exclaimed: " O General, 
181 



THE HEART OF LEE 

what will history say of the surrender 
of the army in the field? " 

" Yes," said the General, " I know 
they Avill say hard things of us; they 
will not understand how we were over* 
whelmed by numbers, but that is not the 
question, Colonel. The question is, 
* Is it right to surrender this army? ' If 
it is right, then I will take all the re- 
sponsibility." 

Once more Robert E. Lee looked 
Duty squarely in the face and sent a 
note to General Grant asking an inter- 
view. The two commanders with their 
staffs, met at the McLean house at Ap- 
pomattox. General Lee, the tall, hand- 
some, courteous gentleman of the old 
school, wore a new gray uniform, with 
a handsome sword and sash. General 
Grant, short, thin and stooped, with a 
soldier's blouse and trousers spattered 
with mud, was without sword, sash or 
spurs. Noticing Lee's observance of 
182 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

the military proprieties, he was at once 
reminded of the occasion when the two 
met in the Mexican war, and Colonel 
Lee had said to him: " I feel it my duty, 
Captain Grant, to call your attention 
to General Scott's order that an officer 
reporting at headquarters should be in 
full uniform." 

General Grant told a friend after- 
ward that he felt uncomfortable that 
day lest General Lee should recall that 
reproof and think he now intended to 
retaliate, so he explained that he had 
not seen his headquarters' baggage for 
several days. 

But General Lee did not even re- 
member having seen Grant in the 
Mexican War. As soon as the pre- 
liminary courtesies were exchanged, 
General Lee, perhaps reminded of 
Grant's stipulations of " Unconditional 
Surrender" to General Buckner, said: 

" General, I am here to ascertain the 
183 



THE HEART OF LEE 

terms upon which you will accept the 
surrender of the Army of Northern 
Virginia; but it is due to proper candor 
and frankness that I should say at once 
that I am not willing to discuss, even, 
any terms incompatible with preserving 
the honor of my army, which I am de- 
termined to maintain at all hazards, and 
to the last extremity." 

Grant hastened to reply, " I have no 
idea of proposing dishonorable terms. 
General, but I should like to know what 
terms you would consider satisfactory." 

The conditions were generous, as be- 
came two Christian generals — even 
more liberal, Lee said, than the noble 
terms of General Washington to Corn- 
wallis. Nothing was said about Gen- 
eral Lee tendering his sword. Twenty- 
five thousand rations were dealt out to 
the starving Confederates, who were 
told to keep their horses to use on their 
farms. When the good, gray general 
184} 



LOYAL IN REBELLION 

came out to his anxious soldiers, they 
received him with " the rebel yell." He 
told them the terms were to men and 
friends who had met reverses like 
heroes. Then he added, with a slight 
tremor in his voice: 

" Men, we have fought through the 
war together. I have done my best for 
you. My heart is too full to say more." 



185 



VIII 

ON THE MOUNT 

And bear unmoved the wrongs of base 

mankind, 
The last and hardest conquest of the mind. 

—Pope. 

Robert E. Lee mounted "Traveler" 
and rode away down the Valley of 
Humiliation. His head was bowed, 
his eyes on the ground. His lips no 
longer moved. Some of his men fol- 
lowed him in pitying silence. As he 
had been thinking only of them, their 
sorrow now was all for him. Their 
hearts also were " too full to say more," 
but they crowded around to press his 
hand and flash their symj)athy up into 
186 



ON THE MOUNT 



his sorrowing face. Of those heroes 
and martyrs of the " Lost Cause " it is 
written: 

" Hunger and thirst could not de- 
press them. Cold could not chill them. 
Every hardship became a joke. Never 
was such a triumph of spirit over 
matter. . . . One by one Death 
challenged them. One by one they 
smiled in his grim visage and refused to 
be dismayed." 

" Human virtue ought to be equal to 
human calamity," Lee himself had said. 
Was he not proving it now in the 
supreme test? But he was not thinking 
of himself. Is the Cause lost — the 
Cause he would give his life for so 
gladly? Had he not given a thousand 
lives for it in spirit? What is it his 
Friend is saying to him? " He that 
loseth his life for my sake shall find it." 
Did Robert E. Lee learn, through this 
awful experience, that there is some- 
187 



THE HEART OF LEE 

thing better than dying for country? 
His patriotism had now become the Re- 
ligion of Comitry. 

The next day, April 10th, he pub- 
lished his last order, which in the nature 
of things took the form of a valedictory: 

" After four years of arduous service, 
marked by unsurpassed courage and 
fortitude, the Army of Northern Vir- 
ginia has been compelled to yield to 
overwhelming numbers and resources. 
I need not tell the survivors of so many 
hard- fought battles, who have remained 
stedfast to the last, that I have con- 
sented to this result from no distrust of 
them; but feeling that valor and devo- 
tion could accomplish nothing that 
could compensate for the loss that 
would have attended the continuation 
of the contest, I have determined to 
avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose 
past services have endeared them to 
their countrymen. By the terms of the 
188 



ON THE MOUNT 



agreement, officers and men can return 
to their homes, and remain there till 
exchanged. 

" You will take with you the satisfac- 
tion that proceeds from the conscious- 
ness of duty faithfully performed ; and I 
earnestly pray that a merciful God will 
extend to you His blessing and protec- 
tion. With an unceasing admiration 
for your constancy and devotion to your 
country, and a grateful remembrance of 
your kind and generous consideration 
of myself, I bid you an affectionate 
farewell." 

After this good-bye, Robert E. Lee 
turned and rode away toward Rich- 
mond, leaving them behind him, " sor- 
rowing most of all for the words which 
he spake," in " that they should see his 
face no more." A few others, going his 
way, joined him and rode on in silence. 
At last he was to be permitted to live at 
home with his loved ones, a private 
189 



THE HEART OF LEE 

citizen. But no, after sacrificing to his 
high sense of duty the beautiful Vir- 
ginia estates that were theirs, he and 
his invalid wife with their devoted chil- 
dren had no home! 

Anyway, he was at last a private 
citizen. Citizen? No, only a paroled 
prisoner denied the franchise and other 
rights and rites of citizenship — like a 
common criminal? No, more like an 
uncommon criminal — the brutal mur- 
derer of many men ! There were cruel, 
unseeing ones at the North who had said 
hanging was too good for him. A 
ribald song sounded in his ears. It 
pained him the more because it was a 
leer against " Jeff " Davis — that sin- 
cere Christian gentleman. The fact 
that they might hang him did not par- 
ticularly concern Robert E. Lee — ex- 
cept for the sake of his suffering family 
and friends. That might be the easiest 
way, after all, to witness for the Cause. 
190 



ON THE MOUNT 



Yes, Lowell was right, in " The Present 
Crisis:" 

" Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong for- 
ever on the throne — 

Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, 
behind the dim unknown, 

Standeth God within the shadow, keeping 
watch above His own." 

In contrast with such lofty sentiment, 
the shallow, spiteful spirit of the worst 
element at the North sickened Lee. 
How little they know what spirit we — 
men like President Davis — are of! 



The little squad in tattered gray ar- 
rived on the bank of the James, oppo- 
site Richmond. The bridges had long 
since been destroyed by his own order — 
to convert the river into a moat like that 
of a great castle. Lee's home-coming 
was described by an eye-witness: 

" Next morning a small group of 
horsemen appeared on the further side 
191 



THE HEART OF LEE 

of the pontoons. By some strange in- 
tuition it was known that General Lee 
was among them, and a crowd collected 
all along the route he would take, silent 
and bareheaded. There was no excite- 
ment, no hurrahing; but as the great 
chief passed, a deep, loving murmur, 
greater than these, rose from the very 
hearts of the crowd. Taking off his 
hat and simply bowing his head, the 
man great in adversity passed silently 
to his own door; it closed upon him, and 
his people had seen him for the last 
time in his battle harness." 

Richmond had fallen, and some sec- 
tions of it had been burned by the in- 
habitants before leaving the city. Grant 
had refused to enter there in triumph. 
Instead, he had said: " I felt like any- 
thing rather than rejoicing at the down- 
fall of a foe who had fought so long and 
so valiantly, and had suffered so much 
for a cause." 

192 



ON THE MOUNT 



So, when the Northern soldiers be- 
gan firing cannon to celebrate the sur- 
render, their chief stopped the salutes 
with this message: " The war is over, 
the rebels are again our countrymen, 
and the best way of showing our rejoic- 
ing will be to abstain from all such 
demonstration." 

When many Southern people heard 
of these and later kindnesses to their be- 
loved leader, they ceased calling Grant 
a " butcher." His terrible measures 
were more like those of a surgeon in the 
last extremity. It was a signal proof 
of Lee's relation to the South, that, as 
soon as he gave up, the war was ended. 

General Chamberlain, who received 
the surrender of the Confederate arms 
and colors — as " a tribute of brave men 
to brave men, and a part of the cement- 
ing of the Union " — referred to the 
silence with which it was achieved: 

" General Gordon, . . . facing 
193 



THE HEART OF LEE 

his own command, gives word for his 
successive brigades to pass us . . . 
honor answering honor. 

" On our part, not a sound of trum- 
pet nor roll of drum ; not a cheer, not a 
word or whisper of vaingiorying, nor 
motion of men; . . . but an awed 
stillness, rather, and breath-holding as 
if it were at the passing of the dead." 

In the White House, during the 
meeting of the President with his Cab- 
inet, the news of Lee's surrender was 
received. " At the suggestion of Mr. 
Lincoln, they all dropped on their 
knees and offered, in silence and in 
tears, their heartfelt acloiowledgments 
to the Almighty." 

On the night of the day on which 
General Lee returned to Richmond, a 
crowd of people gathered around the 
Executive Mansion, with a band, to 
serenade the President and hear what 
he would say. He congratulated them 
194 



ON THE MOUNT 



because the cruel war was over, and sug- 
gested mild and friendly measures to 
win the South again to its primal al- 
legiance. As he closed his remarks and 
was going in, he turned back and called 
out to the band: 

" Play ' Dixie/ boys— play ' Dixie! ' 
You know we have a right to it now." 
Those were the last words Abraham 
Lincoln spoke in public. 

Three days later, the President was 
murdered at Ford's Theatre, by an irre- 
sponsible, crack-brained actor. John 
Wilkes Booth did not represent the 
South in that act any more than Charles 
J. Guiteau stood for the Republican 
party when he shot President Garfield. 

That madman's freak inflamed the 
North, and did much to embitter again 
the mollified spirit, all through the 
trying months and years of so-called 
Reconstruction. 

One Sunday night General Lee 
195 



THE HEART OF LEE 

was pained by hearing the minister bit- 
terly denounce the North from his 
puli)it. After the service he took the 
rector to task. " Doctor," said he, 
" there is a good old Book which says, 
* Love your enemies.' Do you think 
your remarks this evening were quite in 
the spirit of that teaching? " The pas- 
tor was astonished to hear a soldier who 
had " suffered many things " at the 
hands of the North speak without re- 
sentment. At another time the Gen- 
eral explained his attitude more fully: 
" I have fought against the people of 
the North because I believed they were 
seeking to wrest from the South dearest 
rights. But I have never cherished 
bitter or vindictive feelings, and have 
never seen the day when I did not pray 
for them." 

One cannot help asking, Wliy should 
a man who placed such implicit confi- 
dence in God be permitted to suffer de- 
196 



ON THE MOUNT 



feat? His relations with the Aknighty 
were even closer and more personal than 
Cromwell's — more like the intimacy of 
Moses, whom he also resembled in meek- 
ness and modesty. Some of his orders 
to his men read like the charges of 
Moses to the children of Israel in the 
wilderness. Once, in speaking about 
prayer, a minister in his army said of 
the commander: " He grasped my 
hand as, with voice and eye that be- 
trayed deep emotion, he assured me 
that it was not only his comfort, but his 
only comfort, and declared the simple 
and absolute trust that he had in God 
and God alone." 

Lee talked with God as a dutiful son 
with his father. He realized that, while 
God responds to prayer. He is not 
bound always to answer in the affirma- 
tive. He must sometimes withhold for 
the good of His child. " Special Provi- 
dence " with him did not mean special 
197 



THE HEART OF LEE 

petting. His Heavenly Father did not 
grant every request as a human parent 
does when spoiling his child. Robert 
E. Lee, as with his prototype, Moses, 
was " choosing rather to suffer affliction 
with the people of God. . . . By 
faith he forsook Egypt. . . . He 
endured, as seeing Him who is invis- 
ible." 

Like Moses, he also recognized the 
voice of God when it said No, as well 
as when it answered in the affirmative. 
Therefore he accepted defeat, as he had 
welcomed victory, as the will of God. 
He recognized that God's dealings were 
not with him alone but with the whole 
South — yes, with the whole country, for 
he had prayed daily for the North. He 
knew that President Lincoln and many 
thousands of devout men and women 
among " those people," as he called 
them, were praying also to the same 
God. Not only did Lee believe that 
198 



ON THE MOUNT 



slavery was wrong but that it was even 
worse for the white race than for 
the negroes themselves. He had come 
to realize the rank inconsistency of 
linking — manacling — Southern liberty 
with Southern slavery. The principles 
he believed in and had given thousands 
of loved and precious lives for had fallen 
upon evil times and into evil company. 

Therefore he recognized the hand of 
God in the final defeat of the Southern 
armies. From that hour he was never 
impatient or querulous about what hap- 
pened. The same sublime sense of 
Duty that prompted his acceptance of 
the sword now controlled him in sur- 
rendering it. Then whatever came to 
him he patiently ** endured as seeing 
Him who is invisible.'* 

He read in his Bible that Moses, who 

had hoped all things, believed all things, 

endured all things for forty years, was 

not allowed to enter the Land of Prom- 

199 



THE HEART OF LEE 

ise, but he was permitted to see it from 
afar. He knew also that the " Captain 
of his Salvation " he was trying so faith- 
fully to follow, had suffered things in- 
finitely worse than death in apparent 
failure. And Abraham Lincoln's as- 
sassination on the eve of the triumph of 
all his hopes — would not God overrule 
even that for the good of the greater 
country — the Promised Land of his own 
love and of Lincoln's? 

There can be no doubt whatever that 
Robert E. Lee, with his God-given in- 
sight into the future, saw in the removal 
of Lincoln from the work of bringing 
the South, with all its noble chivalry, 
back to its earlier loyalty to the greater 
and better United States, had left so 
much the more for him to do. It was a 
work which he alone could do, as the 
beloved of the Southern people. Lee 
was permitted to do what Lincoln might 
have done if he had lived. 
200 



ON THE MOUNT 



Therefore, he looked upon his per- 
sonal trials as trivial. Great as Robert 
E. Lee's life had been — even as the rival 
of Napoleon in military genius — he was 
now armed and equipped in spirit for 
the grandest triumph of all. As "he 
that ruleth his spirit is better than he 
that taketh a city," he snatched from the 
jaws of defeat one of the sublimest 
triumphs ever compassed by one man. 

Of course, he was too modest to see 
himself as anything other than a " poor 
old Confederate," as he ruefully called 
himself when people crowded round to 
honor him. All he meant to do was 
to retire to some quiet spot to pray 
for his beloved South, to love his ene- 
mies and to bless those who persecuted 
him. 

Many stories are told of different 

propositions made to him, all looking to 

his OA^n comfort and that of his family. 

An English admirer offered him a fine 

201 



THE HEART OF LEE 

estate, with an income of $15,000 a 
year, if he would only accept it and live 
abroad. Lee wrote: " The thought of 
abandoning the country and all that 
must be left in it is abhorrent to my feel- 
ings, and I prefer to struggle for its 
restoration and share its fate than give 
up all as lost, and Virginia has need for 
all her sons." 

He was tendered the presidency of 
an insurance company with a salary of 
$50,000 a year. He declined this, say- 
ing he knew nothing about the business. 
" But, General," said the insurance 
man, " you will not be expected to do 
any work; what we wish is the use of 
your name." 

" Don't you think," answered Lee, 
significantly, " that if my name is worth 
$50,000 a year, I ought to take good 
care of it? " 

The appeal that came closest to his 
heart was that of an old Confederate 
202 



ON THE MOUNT 



soldier who called on him in Richmond 
with this eager proj^osal: 

" General, I'm one of your soldiers, 
and I've come here as the representative 
of four of my comrades who are too 
ragged and dirty to venture to see 
you. 

" We're all Virginians, General, from 
Roanoke County, and they sent me here 
to see you on a little business. They've 
got our President in prison, and now" — 
here the poor fellow gasped — " they— 
talk — about — arresting — you! General, 
we can't — we'll never stand and see that ! 
Now, we five men have got about 250 
acres of land in Roanoke — ^very good 
land, too, sir — and if you'll come up 
there and live, I've come to offer you all 
of it, and we will do all the work for you 
as your field hands, and you'll have very 
little trouble managing it with us to 
help you. And, General, there are 
near about a hundred of us left in old 
203 



THE HEART OF LEE^ 

Roanoke, and they could never take you 
there, for we could hide you in the hol- 
lows of the mountains and the last man 
of us would die before we'd let 'em get 
you! '' 

Robert E. Lee's deep ej^es were wet 
when he gratefully declined the offer, 
and took care that the ragged envoy, 
better dressed than Avhen he came, was 
loaded with grateful remembrances for 
the other four who had offered to lay 
down their lives for him if need be. 

In spite of all these requests and ap- 
peals, Lee's mind was fixed upon a quiet 
retreat, as he wrote to a friend: " I am 
looking for some little quiet house in 
the woods where I can procure shelter 
and my daily bread, if permitted by the 
victor." 

" The victor " now took the form 

of President (elected Vice-President) 

Johnson, (a Southern man!) and of a 

grand jury in beloved Virginia, which 

204 



ON THE MOUNT 



indicted Robert E. Lee and Jefferson 
Davis for treason. This jury was com- 
posed of negroes and low whites who 
acted under the direction of a malignant 
mind. Lee regarded this action with 
supreme indifference, once making this 
remark: " I have heard of the indict- 
ment by the grand jurj^ of Norfolk, and 
have made up my mind to let the 
authorities take their course. I have no 
wish to avoid any trial the Government 
may order, and I cannot flee." 

But the President's proclamation 
granting freedom to all the South but 
Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and all 
officers in the army above a certain rank, 
would involve others in expense and 
danger, and was contrary to the terms 
of the surrender at Appomattox. So 
he wrote to General Grant: 

" I had supposed that the officers and 
men of the Army of Northern Virginia 
were by the terms of their surrender 
205 



THE HEART OF LEE 

protected by the United States Gov- 
ernment so long as they conformed to 
its conditions. 

" I am ready to meet any charges 
that may be preferred against me, and 
do not wish to avoid trial; but if I am 
correct as to the protection granted by 
my parole, and am not to be prosecuted, 
I desire to comply with the President's 
proclamation, and therefore enclose the 
required application, which I request, 
in that event, may be acted upon." 

In this letter he sent his application 
" for the benefits and full restoration of 
all rights and privileges extended," in- 
cluding those of ordinary citizenship. 
In doing this he was setting an example 
consistent with his urging, in every ^vay 
he could, that " all should unite in an 
honest effort to obliterate the effects of 
the war and restore the blessings of 
peace." 

To the eternal credit of General 
206 



ON THE MOUNT 



Grant be it said that he wrote his official 
indignation to Secretary-of-War Stan- 
ton, and added, in a note to President 
Johnson : 

" I have made certain terms with Lee, 
the best and only terms. If I had told 
him and his army that their liberty 
would be invaded, that they would be 
open to arrest, trial and execution for 
treason, Lee would never have surren- 
dered, and we should have lost many 
lives in destroying him. 

" Now, my terms of surrender were 
according to military law, and so long 
as General Lee observes his parole, I 
will never consent to his arrest. I will 
resign the command of the army rather 
than execute any order directing me to 
arrest Lee or any of his commanders so 
long as they obey the laws." (This is 
a reminder of the very spirit which Rob- 
ert E. Lee manifested in resigning his 
command, four years before.) 
207 



THE HEART OF LEE 

The indictment against General Lee 
was quashed, but President Johnson 
paid no attention to his application for 
pardon, so Robert E. Lee went to and 
fro, himself a " Man without a Coun- 
try," yet urging other men to become 
citizens of that country ! 

Before he could move to the modest 
little place where he could live in retire- 
ment, General Lee was offered the 
presidency of Washington College, an 
institution then more than one hundred 
years old. " The war had practically 
closed its doors, its buildings were 
pillaged and defaced and its library 
scattered." It had now only four pro- 
fessors. Even the small salary of the 
president would depend mostly on his 
own efforts and influence. Yet as soon 
as Lee was convinced that the incum- 
bency of a disfranchised prisoner-at- 
large would not be an incumbrance, he 
gladly accepted the position, for this 
208 



ON THE MOUNT 



stated reason: " I have a self-imposed 
task which I must accomplish. I have 
led the men of the South in battle, I 
have seen many of them die on the field ; 
I shall devote my remaining energies to 
training young men to do their duty in 
life." 

Here was an aged, white-haired man 
entering upon a new career instead of 
retiring to rest after an arduous, event- 
ful life in which he had been making 
history. He was doing all this, too, 
without any preparation for such work 
since the school-days of his boyhood in 
Alexandria, and the few years he was 
superintendent at West Point. But he 
was well fitted to follow the great 
Teacher, as an educator of the heart. 
His meekness is disclosed in a few lines 
from a letter written at this time: 
" Life is indeed gliding away, and I 
have nothing good to show for mine that 
is past. I pray I may be spared to 
209 



THE HEART OF LEE' 

accomplish something for the benefit of 
mankind and the honor of God." 

This was true in a way of which the 
self-depreciating writer did not dream. 
Great as his achievements had been, 
those yet to come were more than great, 
they were sublime. 

Nothing could have been more mod- 
est than the elderly, full-bearded man 
riding alone up into the western moun- 
tains on the old white horse which had 
carried him through the thick of many 
a fray. His love of his horse never 
grew old. One Summer, while he was 
absent, the master wrote back: " How 
is ' Traveler? ' Tell him I miss him 
dreadfully, and have repented of our 
separation but once — and that is, the 
whole time since we parted! " 

Once, as he mounted " Traveler," 

while taking leave of some ladies, he saw 

one of them reaching out to pluck a 

white hair from the horse's mane. 

210 



ON THE MOUNT 



Wishing to spare the animal the least 
hurt, General Lee doffed his hat, bent 
his own white head low before the lady, 
and said, with a beseeching smile, 
" Please, madam, take one of mine in- 
stead!" 

The General was inaugurated Presi- 
dent of Washington College on October 
2nd, 1865, with simple ceremonies, and 
started, in every way possible, to build 
up the college. His renown soon at- 
tracted students and endowments. In- 
stead of the military regvilations one 
would expect from a man who had spent 
nearly forty years in the army service, 
he announced: " We have but one rule 
here, that every student be a gentle- 
man." 

The young men believed that if there 
had been a chair for instruction in that 
popular study, their president was the 
best possible teacher! Far from being 
a martinet in matters of etiquet or con- 
211 



THE HEART OF LEE 

vention. President Lee once remarked: 
" I always respect persons and care lit- 
tle for precedent." 

He was called to Washington in 
March, 1866, to testify before the Con- 
gressional committee on Reconstruc- 
tion. Although he considered the Gov- 
ernment policy a hideous blunder, he 
won the admiration of the whole coim- 
try by his fairness, candor and fine feel- 
ing. After returning home, his daugh- 
ter remarked upon his new hat. He 
replied with a laugh : " You do not like 
my hat? Why, there were a thousand 
people on Pennsylvania Avenue in 
Washington the other day admiring this 
hat ! " This illustrated the enthusiasm 
he encountered wherever he went. In 
the South, whether in city or countrj^ 
they cheered him, greatly to his em- 
barrassment. 

The president of the struggling col- 
lege was forced to refuse a friend who 
212 



ON THE MOUNT 



offered him a salary of $20,000 a year, 
as president of a substantial company. 
" I would like to make some money for 
Mrs. Lee," he said, " as she has not 
much left, if it does not require me to 
leave the college." But President Lee 
considered it his duty to give the college 
all of himself at about one-tenth the 
additional salary he had declined. 

One Summer, while he was away for 
his health, the trustees of the college, in 
consideration of the sacrifices he was 
making, and knowing that nearly the 
whole of Sirs. Lee's great fortune had 
been swept away by the war, voted to 
present him with a house and settle 
an annuity of $3,000 a year on his 
family. 

Lee emphatically declined this. In 
thanking the board, he wrote: "I am 
unwilling that my family should become 
a tax to the college, but desire that all 
its funds should be devoted to the pur- 
213 



THE HEART OF LEE 

poses of education. I feel sure that, in 
case a competency should not be left to 
my wife, her children would never suffer 
her to want." 

In spite of his limited resources he 
helped his sons establish themselves on 
farms, encouraged them to work hard 
at manual toil, telling them that the land 
would soon reward their labors, and that 
the future of the State and the nation 
depended on the industry and thrift of 
the farmers. His far-seeing eye had 
already beheld what the New South was 
yet to be. 

General Lee was invited to become a 
candidate for governor of Virginia — 
probably the only civil office he had 
ever cared to hold, because his father, 
"Light-Horse Harry," had filled it. 
But he refused even to consider it. He 
still felt the apparent disgrace of dis- 
franchisement, as if he were, in very 
deed, a criminal ! Besides, it would im- 
214 



ON THE MOUNT 



pair his influence with the people of the 
South if he went into time-serving 
politics. 

Many men, official and military. 
North as well as South, tried to get ex- 
pressions of approval from him, but he 
politely declined to be drawn into any 
controversy. He carefully abstained 
from making any remarks or criticism 
even about those who had been bitterly 
hostile to him. Having occasion to be 
in Washington, in 1869, soon after Gen- 
eral Grant's inauguration, he called 
upon him but considerately refused to 
ask the President to visit Washington 
College, as had been suggested, lest it 
embarrass that official, or be made an 
occasion for hostile remark. 

A young professor in the college 
harshly criticized Grant one day, and 
President Lee said severely: 

"Sir, if you ever presume to speak 
disrespectfully of General Grant in my 
215 



THE HEART OF LEE 

presence, either you or I will sever his 
connection with this college." 

To a Southern lady who inveighed 
against the national order of things, 
he replied earnestly: "Madam, don't 
bring up your sons to detest the United 
States Government. Recollect that we 
form one country now. Abandon all 
these local animosities, and make your 
sons Americans! " 

One day the college president was 
seen at the gate talking in a friendly 
manner with a poor old man to whom he 
gave some money and sent on his way 
rejoicing. The observer asked who the 
stranger was. 

" One of our old soldiers," said the 
General. 

" To whose command did he belong?" 

" Oh — ^he was one of those who 

fought against us," said Lee gently, 

" but we are all one now, and must make 

no difference in our treatment of them." 

216 



ON THE MOUNT 



Perhaps there was never a better ex- 
ample of meekness under trying circum- 
stances than the simple story of a sopho- 
more who had been called before the 
president to be impressed with the fact 
that he must mend his ways or become 
a failure in life. 

'* But, General, you failed! " an- 
swered the youth (who, no doubt, re- 
gretted that thoughtless remark all 
through his after life). The great man 
of his day and generation answered 
without the least resentment: " I hope 
that you may be more fortunate than I." 

Because he said least about what he 
felt most deeply, there can be no doubt 
that Robert E. Lee suffered keenly un- 
der his disfranchisement. The story of 
" The Man without a Country " had ap- 
peared early in the war, and such a tale 
must have made an abiding appeal to a 
man who loved Country so much. 
217 



THE HEART OF LEE 

General Zachary Taylor, another 
great military man of the South, had 
been elected to the presidency without 
ever having voted in his life. Here, 
now, was Robert E. Lee — far greater 
as a man and as a general — who, by his 
own personal influence, had done more 
for the country than any other living 
man in bringing back the Southern 
States into the Union, yet he was not 
allowed even to cast his vote which had 
now become the privilege of the most 
vicious and ignorant negro! 

In his habit of self-depreciation Lee 
felt all this as keenly as though his home 
and property had been confiscated and 
he himself exiled from the country of 
his birth. No wonder that he yearned 
for the Home he so firmly believed was 
prepared for him by the Friend who 
had gone before him into the Beyond. 

This was all the more heartbreaking 
in that he was too considerate to speak 
218 



ON THE MOUNT 



even to his wife of his unutterable 
loss. His health had not been good 
after that illness in the Wilderness. He 
had never seemed quite so strong after 
the mental anguish before Appomattox. 
His famous physical heroism in the war 
was mere indifference beside the moral 
courage which carried him through the 
spiritual agony that followed. It was 
like an internal wound that proved to be 
mortal, of which no one knew until after 
he was gone. 

The dagger of his disfranchisement 
was driven deeper into his own heart by 
the exasperating experiences of his be- 
loved South under the ill-advised 
measures of " Reconstruction," often 
executed by Southern villains of the 
deepest dye. Unable to cry out against 
it, lest it add to the anguish of those he 
loved best, he bore it all in smiling 
silence. In his age and feebleness, as 
he witnessed the needless wranglings 
219 



THE HEART OF LEE 

and recriminations, how he longed, Hke 
the homesick Scot in a foreign land, for 
his " Ain Comitrie!" 

Early in 1870 his strength finally 
gave way and he consented to go South 
with his daughter Agnes in quest of 
health. They visited his father's "Light- 
Horse Harry's," grave on Cumberland 
Island, and that of his daughter Annie, 
over whose death he had wept so bitterly 
in the little tent not far from Fred- 
ericksburg. 

Everywhere he went he received an 
ovation, but he could in no wise under- 
stand the love that all the people bore 
him. He returned, hoping against 
hope that his health had improved, and 
opened the college as usual that Fall. 
Coming home one evening after a trj^- 
ing day at his regular work, followed 
by a three-hour vestry meeting, he be- 
came unconscious at the supper table. 
After lingering for two weeks, he 
220 



ON THE MOUNT 



passed away on the morning of October 
12th. During his delirium he seemed 
to have gone back into his greatest 
battle — Chancellorsville — where he lost 
his " right arm," " Stonewall " Jack- 
son, whose last words there had been: 
" Tell A. P. Hill to prepare for action." 
General Lee's last command was, " Tell 
A. P. Hill he must come up " — then 
the David and Jonathan of the Con- 
federacy met and embraced in their 
" Ain Countrie." They now lie near 
each other in their home town of Lex- 
ington. 

Robert E. Lee's name is linked with 
that of his father's friend in the title of 
the college he did so much to make — 
Washington and Lee University. He 
did not die literally a " Man without a 
Country," for Andrew Johnson had, on 
his last Christmas in the presidential 
office, extended a formal pardon to 
Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and 
221 



THE HEART OF LEE 

other men of high rank and achieve- 
ment from whom it had been withheld. 
But, except in foohsh form, it was far 
beyond the poor power of such a man 
as " Andy " Johnson to withhold citi- 
zenship from, or grant it to, such a man 
as Robert E. Lee! By his simple re- 
fusal to perform an official act, Presi- 
dent Johnson had foolishly deprived the 
country of a legal right to have and to 
hold a citizen who was even then prov- 
ing himself a most dutiful son — the 
greatest man living within her borders 
since the tragic death of Abraham 
Lincoln. 

Only three men have possessed the 
country in such a lofty and lawful pro- 
prietorship: Washington, the father, 
Lincoln, the saver, and Lee, the re- 
deemer of his country. 

As George Washington, by force of 
the personal love of all the people, was 
able to join the States together in a 
222 



ON THE MOUNT 



mutual bond, called the Constitution of 
the United States; and as Abraham 
Lincoln, who, like Samson of old, con- 
quered more people in his seemingly 
disastrous death than all those he had 
won during his lifetime; so Robert 
E. Lee, through the pure and lofty 
loyalty of his life, brought back into 
one the eleven States that had se- 
ceded against his will, and* locked them 
into a firm and eternal Union, from 
which " they shall go no more out for- 
ever." 

What, then, did the eye of his sublime 
faith see from the Mount of Vision? 
Better, far better than the Promised 
Land of Moses, Robert E. Lee beheld 
from afar — not " the Lost Cause," but 
his " Paradise Regained " — yet to be, 
in the highest and noblest sense, his 
" Ain Countrie." 

" He hath showed thee, O Man, 
what is good; and what doth the Lord 
223 



THE HEART OF LEE^. 

require of thee, but to do justly, to love 
mercy, and to walk humbly with thy 
God? " 



224. 



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